


The Revelation Angel Rescue Team

by RedPony



Series: Angel Revelation [1]
Category: Lucifer (TV)
Genre: Angel Wings, Angst, Auction, F/M, Human Trafficking, Humiliation, Kidnapping, Post-Season/Series 02, Rescue, Revelations
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-22
Updated: 2019-10-28
Packaged: 2020-12-28 07:26:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 24,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21132908
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedPony/pseuds/RedPony
Summary: A rewritten version ofThe Untitled Angel Rescue Teambyviolent_endsAn alternative revelation story at the end of season 2Summary:Set after Season 2 but right before Season 3.The revelation we had hoped for at the beginning of season three.Lucifer really wants to tell Chloe the truth, but then he gets kidnapped under mysterious circumstances. Chloe investigates on his disappearance with the help of Dan and Ella and they discover more than they've expected.Beta read done and up! Any mistakes still left are completely mine!This will now be part of a series. Check out the next work for continuation.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [violent_ends](https://archiveofourown.org/users/violent_ends/gifts).
  * Inspired by [The Untitled Angel Rescue Team](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20913227) by [violent_ends](https://archiveofourown.org/users/violent_ends/pseuds/violent_ends). 

> This fiction is a reworked and supplemented version of the very interesting work of violent_ends amazing story.  
It really hit me hard and set my plot bunny hut in flames so that the little critters started to hop in every possible direction.  
This story contains wide parts of the original story but goes in a completely different direction.  
Enjoy and leave some kudos at their work as well.

The man sat in the passenger seat of an unassuming service truck and looked at the scene in front of him.

It was very late. Even in this district of town, the streets were almost empty and the few people still around wouldn’t remember a cleaning truck. And if they did, they would see nothing out of the ordinary. He watched closely when some of them entered the building. It looked all natural, no hint that only his men were there and not the usual staff. 

It looked like just the usual coming and going every night at the same time collecting what others left after indulging. Nothing out of the ordinary here at this building. 

The silhouette of LUX, the fancy nightclub, was right in front of them. It was impressive, beautiful even, but the man knew it was also rotten in the core. He knew of that monster dwelling within and what it could do. And tonight he was about to take it down and claim it as his property. 

His crew shuffled a little in the back; they were ready. But still, they had to wait till everything was in place. 

Till his unaware double agent would enter the building. 

And there she was, she drove right up towards the building unknowing of her role in all of this. She entered carelessly. 

Did she know what she was walking into? Whose den this was?

He didn’t care. It didn’t matter. She would play her role without even realizing what she’d done. She wouldn’t even see them. But now they had to move fast.

He signaled the driver and slowly they reached the building, their vehicle reached the garage beneath the building. It was spacious, more than enough room. 

The man got out of the car and stretched. Looking at the lavish vintage cars at the side he sneered. Even in the garage the enormous wealth of that creature showed. But even if he had promised his accomplices they'd get tons of money, lots of money for what they were about to do, this was not about money. He could have gotten money directly from their intended prey but  _ That _ wasn’t what he wanted. It wasn’t enough. 

He had seen what happened if people dealt with this thing, had seen what happened to his brother and didn't trust he’d not go down the same drain if he dared to confront the beast directly so he would do this in his way. 

He wasn’t a tall man, by no means, he also wasn't an especially handsome man, moderately handsome at best, and it wasn’t the most powerful man in the world, far from it.

But tonight he would be special. He would do what no one on earth had done before. 

He would catch an impossible being and chain it to his convenience. He would take away everything that creature valued, humiliating it and put it in its rightful place at the feet of mankind. 

Tonight the devil would fall for a second time. 

For his brother. 

______♠______

Lucifer’s head was pounding which was inconvenient and also kind of new. It hurt to open his eyes and the surface under his knees and against his naked back was too hard and too cold. Something pressed too tightly around his neck, making it hard to swallow, harder than it should be. Squinting against a light he didn’t know the source of, he blindly reached up to tug at it and gasped when his fingers came in contact with a thick, sturdy metal collar.

In a flash, he remembered sitting at his piano, his back deliberately tuned towards the lift. He just had received an answer from his detective. She was on her way to him ready to finally learn the truth. He had decided to enjoy the last moments before… well, before everything was going to change. 

No more evasion, no more denying and bathing in the wrong security, her cluelessness provided. This was it, the moment of truth. 

He heard the elevator ding and sighed. 

“So that’s it, Detective,” he exclaimed more upbeat than he felt. “You sure you’re ready for the truth?” He heard a slight shuffling of feet. He barely had time to register that something was off before ten or more men were on him, lifting him off by force and tackling him to the ground.

He remembered throwing punches, slaps, kicks. Growling, screaming, fighting, his body getting heated but his devil form not appearing.

A voice, distant and almost bored.

“Just knock him out, I need him to look immaculate.”

A blow to the back of his head, then darkness, and not the one he was the prince of.

A jolt of electricity shot down his spine from the back of his neck, forcing him to move his hand away from the collar as he flinched in mild pain. Grunting in annoyance and disbelief, he opened his eyes to find himself inside a glass box lined with lots of ornamental framework. A closer look revealed how the ornaments formed an intricate barrier around the extremely thick glass. This was an elaborate cage without locks but still barred very tightly. A glance showed a beige room full of other glass boxes and wooden crates, seemingly with no windows. There was a black man beyond the glass, bald and in his forties, wearing a black suit. He reminded Lucifer of someone, but he couldn't say who.

“Hey there, my golden ticket" the man grinned, tapping one finger against the glass as if Lucifer was a bloody fish inside an aquarium tank. It was the same voice as in the penthouse.

Lucifer’s body tensed and his anger rose at the realization and in response to the humiliating nickname, his body lunged forward of its own accord, fists raised ready to strike and crush the glass that separated him from the fool who thought he could imprison the Devil himself. But something pulled him back from above, cutting the airflow from his throat just in time, and electricity coursed through him again, slightly more intense than a moment ago, just before his fists could touch their intended target.

He slumped back down on the transparent floor of the container and coughed while struggling to breathe again, shocked by the pain. ‘What was this? How come anything on this plane can hurt him? Did they take the Detective, too?’ The thoughts terrified him; his heart was beating too fast in his chest, his breath reduced to quickened, panicked gasps. When he looked up, he saw a chain dangling from the top of the box, connecting the back of the collar to it. 

Like a leash. 

The metal was dark and irritatingly familiar, although he couldn’t place it right away. It was effectively chaining him to the spot like a bad dog that misbehaved. He glared down at the man again, outraged, bristling with barely repressed fury.

“Who the hell are you?” he snapped. “What do you want?”

It wasn’t the smooth, seductive question he usually asked to draw out desires, because frankly, right now he didn’t have the patience for it. Before answering, the man tilted his head to the side in fascination.

“Money,” he said with a strange smile, ignoring Lucifer’s first question altogether. “Lots and lots and lots of money.”

Despite the situation, Lucifer couldn’t help but chuckle darkly, almost amusedly. Humans.

“That’s it? You want... a ransom?” he mocked, shaking his head at the notion of anyone else being asked to pay money to rescue him when in truth he couldn't think of anyone richer than himself who would spare even a thought. “You could have asked me back at the penthouse, you poor sod, I would have written you a blank check. Surely you must know I have the cash to spare.”

It’s the man’s turn to laugh, apparently – not that Lucifer liked it, but he didn’t like a lot of things at that moment.

“Ah, yes, I know that but... you don’t have the kind of money I want.”

"Then you are not as well informed as you think you are. You have no idea the sources I could have drawn from to satisfy your greed."

The man laughed again. Then he looked at him with a sardonic grin. "Yeah, I bet. As if you'd have a reason to do so and as if I'd forget there are strings tied to your generosity. No thank you. I'd rather have this my way."

Lucifer’s brow furrowed in confusion, and the feeling only intensified when the man raised one of his hands in front of him to show what he held in it: a small remote with various buttons, all lined up in a straight, vertical line. Settings.

“Now...” the man spoke again, pressing what seemed to be the lowest one at the same time. Lucifer jerked, clenching his jaw against the dim but pinching, buzzing sensation shooting down from the back of the collar.

“How are you doing that?” he asked, increasingly irritated by whatever this game was about. “How are you---"

“Hurting you?” the man smirked, juggling the remote from hand to hand in satisfaction. “Oh, I’m not telling you that. But it’s quite clever, if I may say so myself.”

Please, not her, Lucifer thought, even though he had no idea what else it could be. Anything but her.

The pleased grin on his captor's face hint at the fact that he knew something was required to weaken him, to make him vulnerable to physical pain. This man knew who Lucifer was, he could feel it. Maybe he simply found another way. Maybe Dad decided to throw a new card in the game and provide humans with another weapon to play with his on-and-off immortality like a light switch, just for the fun of it.

“Am I alone here?” he tried, hoping to get an answer that would put his dread about Chloe's involvement to rest. After that, he would focus on how to free himself and give this miscreant the punishment he deserved for messing with him.

“Oh, you’re worried about her? Don’t be, she’s not here" the man reassured him, although Lucifer couldn't say he liked the fact that he even knew who Chloe was. “It’s only you and me.”

Good. Another way it was, then. ‘Thank you, Father, just when I thought I was finally catching a break.’

The unknown man’s thumb deliberately moved upwards to brush the higher button of the remote, making a show of it; turning the device toward Lucifer to make sure he could see.

“Now, Mr. Morningstar... you’ll open those precious angel wings of yours for me, yes?”

______♠______

Chloe’s foot tapped exasperatedly against the elevator’s floor as she made her way up to the penthouse. She was nervous, pent up. So he was going to give her the truth? She wondered what that might be, had no idea what to expect. Hell, she wasn’t even sure she truly believed him able to come clean, to get rid of all his metaphors. 

The ride came to an end and the elevator gave a soft ‘ding’ when the doors finally opened. 

“Lucifer, what do you have to...” she started when the elevator’s doors opened before her, but the last word died in her throat at the sight that welcomed her.

The main area of the penthouse was a mess of broken glass, upturned furniture and torn leather couches.

“Lucifer?” she called as panic started to grow inside her, making her voice shake. She got out her gun and pointed it ahead as she slowly walked further inside, surveying the scene to look for any sign of Lucifer or any threat. She tried not to touching anything, but small shards of glass crunched under the soles of her shoes as she passed by what used to be the table. She could see blood on the tiny, irregularly shaped fragments when she dared to glance down, swallowing.

When she reached the bedroom, she found Lucifer’s phone on the nightstand, a confirmation of how unreachable he currently was. And when she ended her quick inspection and found herself standing near the piano, she saw a bigger amount of fresh blood on the floor, pooling in one specific spot. How could that be? It looked as if whoever did this had sneaked past her just moments before. 

The penthouse was empty, and it occurred to Chloe that it had become a crime scene, of a kidnapping or... she didn’t want to entertain the possibility of another option. She upholstered her gun and pulled her phone out of her pocket. She stared at the screen for a long moment, ready to call this in and involve the whole force in the search.

But what if this wasn’t a crime scene she could let the police investigate, especially if some of the blood was not Lucifer’s? And what if it was, what would that mean? 

What ‘truth’ did he want to talk to her about? What if this was related? What had he gotten himself into? Did he offend someone? His family? Had they taken him to prevent him from talking to her? If yes how had they known? And if whatever people involved in his truths had known he wanted to talk to her about, what else might they know, with whom might they be connected?

She wasn't alone in this, though. She knew people who'd understand, people who could help, and people who like her eccentric partner or at least like her and might be willing to help.

So Chloe unlocked her phone and started calling those she believed could be helpful in this.

Many hushed conversations had been held but the main message was simple: Lucifer is missing. Something is wrong. No, I don’t think he just left again. Come to the penthouse, right now.

After talking to everyone she could think of, even texting Mazikeen if she could reach Amenadiel, she started to pace. 

She hoped her roomie would come too but she doubted she would be leaving Linda’s bedside anytime soon. Chloe tucked her phone back in her pocket and focused on the evident signs of struggle in front of her eyes, trying to be as detached and professional as she could. Inside her chest, her heart was beating frantically as she contemplated the power someone had to possess to win a fight against Lucifer. She’d seen him throw a person through a glass wall and shatter it. Who could have attacked him so vigorously?

Dan and Ella were the first to arrive. As instructed, Ella brought her forensics kit. Her camera and shoulder bag bounced with her steps as she walked in, with Dan trailing behind her. Their eyes widened at the state of the penthouse before landing on an anguished Chloe sitting on one of the bar stools.

“What the hell happened here?” Dan asked, looking around in shock. “Where is Lucifer?”

“I don’t know" Chloe replied, standing up to join them at the entrance. “I saw him last time when we spoke about the happenings at the pier, I was supposed to meet him here, he called me but when I got here I found this. LUX is closed tonight so the staff couldn’t have seen him. I think someone took him.”

They both blinked several times at her.

“How?” Ella asked, while absentmindedly producing a pair of purple gloves from the side pocket of her bag. “There’s only one entrance here and this doesn’t look as if it had much time to get old.”

“I don’t know" she found herself saying, again, and it was frustrating because she couldn't answer. “My best guess so far is that it happened right after I arrived. But I have no idea how I could not have seen anything”

Dan stepped closer and shot a look at the scene. “You know that this should be called in?” he huffed, “why did you call just us on this now?”

Chloe’s shoulders slumped and she looked back at her ex. “I got a hunch something is very wrong.” Dan looked at her with an unreadable expression of disbelief, so she went on, “he-he called me earlier, spoke to my voicemail…” she trailed off and with a huff, she took out her phone again and replayed the message she had received from her quirky partner. 

When it was finished Dan looked at her with even more disbelief. “I've known that something is shady with that guy.” He started. “I mean, look at this Chloe, and open your eyes! If this doesn’t just scream shady, what else do you need to…”

“Don’t you think I know that?” Chloe interrupted him. “But that’s it! If he had feared something like this could have happened, if he maybe even thought something more could have happened, I mean, maybe he needed to make sure he could trust us? Maybe there were some cops involved? How come they’ve chosen this exact moment to get to him? Exactly this one moment to snatch him away when he finally tells me he's willing to talk?” 

Dan still looked skeptical but considering his own not so clean past he could not deny her accusations in this instance. She might have a point.

“Please, Dan! Whatever he might or might not be, he has proven to be useful to us. He has been a very good partner to me, without him, I’d still being shamed for Palmetto.” 

This made Dan blush and turn away. 

“Without him, I’d be dead! Who knows how he got that antidote? Do you know? He saved me and Trixi! He deserves us dealing carefully with this!”

Dan looked down, he stood there, still, for what seemed an eternity. 

Chloe went on: “I don’t say we won’t call it in eventually. I just ask that we'll do it quietly at first, keep it down a little but document thoroughly. If we come across something serious, we can still call it in. You know better than me that there are some corners one can easily cut at least a little. ”

This was somewhat of a low blow but she needed this to work out her way for once. Dan looked up at her like a beaten dog. He nodded almost unnoticeably.

Finally, Chloe looked at the lab tech next. “Ella…” she stammered, at a loss for words. She could not explain it. She just had the definite feeling that Lucifer’s well being depended on their discretion. 

Ella smiled fondly at Chloe and shot her an amused side glance before announcing, “Okay, let me work my magic and see what I can find out.”

With that, she left them in front of the elevator and started taking pictures. Then, Ella proceeded to kneel in different spots to examine particular pieces of furniture or glass, and Chloe saw her collecting samples of the blood she found along the way, finishing with the main pool near the piano.

Ella was storing everything back inside the bag when the elevator dinged and opened again, this time revealing a frantic Mazikeen.

“What’s up now Decker" she rambled, pushing past Chloe before crossing her arms severely, and staring down on the scene in front of her. “So he’s gone missing?”

Chloe knit her brows and frowned at the woman.

“Yes, and not to get married in Vegas this time, I'm afraid” she found the strength to quip, earning a mocking huff in return. “Where is Amenadiel? We could certainly use his help to look for his brother.”

Maze huffed again. “Couldn’t reach him. Would have been useless anyway.”

Chloe turned around exasperated. “Maze! This is important! Lucifer vanished just when he left me a message and promised to show me everything! He promised to let me in on all his secrets and then he gets beaten and dragged away. They both claim they are family! We need to know what’s going on here! He’s our best chance to find out what to do!”

Maze turned towards her and glared. “He did what? He wanted to show you?”

All of a sudden Chloe realized to whom she was talking too. 

“Mazikeen, what do you know? You’ve been with him before any of us even knew he existed! What can you tell us to help?”

With that she tapped her phone and let it play again, watching the face of the woman in front of her closely, searching her face for any sign of … whatever. She was surprised by what she saw. The expression changed from cold indifference to surprise and finally rage. 

“I can’t believe it!” Maze exclaimed, “he was going to do it again! Making choices without regard! Never asking me!”

She stormed back and forth in the vicinity of the elevator. “Mazikeen!” Chloe exclaimed, “What is it? What do you know?” 

But the other woman just huffed and looked at her furiously. “It’s obviously not my place to tell.” She spat. “You wouldn’t believe anyways.” She turned away. “By the way, I doubt that this is his blood. You would have needed to be close to anybody being able to subdue him and he can’t be held against his will. So if he’s not here, he’s running.”

“I have no idea what this has to do with anything but I was close.” Chloe finally managed to press out. “The blood is fresh and it could only have happened mere minutes before I got up here, I walked through LUX first, I thought he might be down there somewhere. 

Mazikeen stopped and stared at her. But she still didn’t explain more.

Chloe huffed in frustration; there was no time for this. So she turned back to more solid sources of information.

“Ella, what can you tell us?”

Ella shuffled back to where she started her careful and methodical exploration, her expression somber.

“I think the struggle started there, near the piano” she pointed with a gloved finger. “Can’t say for sure how many people, but I'm going to guess more than five. The blood is fresh so it’s possible that it happened right before you came, just as you said. I'm going to test it to see if it belongs to Lucifer or someone else that we can try and track down.”

“Fine, just how do we know if it is his?” Chloe reminded her. “I can’t remember we’ve ever taken any samples from him have we?”

Mazikeen snorted a burst of derisive laughter in the background but the detective ignored her. 

“I know, I know" Ella reassured, “I’ll see that I gather some samples from around here to see if I can get a match.” She turned around looking. “Better be something very personal though, and even then there is no way to be sure….” She trailed off before gesturing to the stairs that lead to the kitchen. “There is a bit of a gap in the glass pattern, so I think whoever attacked him dragged him away through there. Is there a secondary entrance and exit?”

Chloe shivered at the image Ella just painted but tried to stay focused for Lucifer’s sake.

Mazikeen chimed in quite unexpectedly.

“It’s a service elevator, for the people who refill his kitchen. It connects it to a storage room and pantry at the bottom of the building" she explains. “If they forced their entry from there, it would explain why Chloe didn’t see anyone.”

“Okay, I’m going to head down there and take a look" Ella concluded, nodding vigorously. “Don’t worry, girl, we'll find him.”

Chloe nodded back, but with less conviction. Ella squeezed her shoulder and left the room to do what she said. In the silence that settled, Chloe thought she could hear Lucifer screaming, struggling, fighting back against men who have no faces in her mind yet. They could be demons for all she knew, or some other kind of monster of the dark that she thought couldn’t exist, but did. Vampires? Werewolves? Gremlins? Okay, maybe paranoia was getting the best of her now.

“Maybe we should just call this in," Dan said from the bar, snapping her out of her increasingly worrying fantasies, “and file a missing person report.”

‘Perhaps he’s not wrong’, Chloe thought. 

“You can’t let any other human deal with this" a rough voice commanded, and when they all turned around, they saw Maze stepping forward, her chin pulled up straight in her no-nonsense attitude.

“Maze! So nice of you to join our discussion," she chastised her flat mate without much heart in it, but the demon glared at her nonetheless.

“Oh, bite me, Decker, I have a good reason for being obscure" she snapped, one hand on her hip as the other suddenly held up her phone. “I just received a text. An ex-con I brought to justice, a former smuggler who is now on parole, keeps me updated on any weird activity in the city. He’s out of the game but still has a few contacts. After the wing theft, the flaming sword and stuff I wanted to keep an eye on anything even remotely related to celestials. I don’t like the idea of being caught by surprise.”

Chloe and Dan looked at each other. This whole celestial nonsense again! Why did those two need to be so eccentric?

Without waiting for an answer, Mazikeen tapped the screen of her phone and let them in on a call, putting it on speaker.

“Here’s Maze. Your information might be useful. I’m with some associates, something has occurred. Tell them more about that text you just send" she ordered to the person on the other end of the line. There was a pause.

“Who are they?” asked the voice of her interlocutor, a male voice. Mazikeen rolled her eyes and shifted her hips, impatient.

“Just spill it!”

During the pause that followed, Dan moved closer and quietly joined Chloe and Maze at the elevator, the only place where they could avoid stepping through the chaos of the attack.

“Okay, fine. There was supposed to be a very exclusive auction announced tonight, for rich fanatics of the occult, like the last one.”

Dan looked puzzled, only vaguely remembering a BOLO put out for angel wings back when Lucifer’s had gone missing; but Chloe knew what the man was talking about. Chloe will make sure to bring him up to speed after the call. For now, this didn’t sound useful. At all. But it was happening tonight, right after Lucifer was taken, so it might be connected. The wings on sale had been fake the first time around had the ones Lucifer had made been so accurate that believers could be tricked into believing them to be real? Was Lucifer kidnapped to make new ones, after the FBI seized everything? It just seemed like a lot of extra trouble when the internet was full of pretty accurate representations of angel wings. And also...

“Wait, who is behind it?” she asked her face closer to Maze’s phone. “Carmen is... out of business.”

She remembered pretty well this whole debacle that had made her put out a BOLO for wings after all! And the man who had taken Lucifer’s stuff, well... like Jimmy Barnes, he will probably live out the rest of his days in a mental hospital. She’s not sure Dan was ready for this level of detail, though. Not with him being skeptical already.

“His younger brother Dylan took over" Mazikeen’s informant explained over the phone. “He works so far under the radar that I'm pretty sure not even the FBI knows about it this time. He disappeared for a while, probably collecting fake crap overseas, but a source told me he’s pitching this auction by saying he has something special in store, totally legit and priceless.”

Dread crawled its way down Chloe’s spine to her feet, making her legs wobble for a moment. Ella had come back up eventually and stared at her with wide eyes while Mazikeen had a very serious expression on her face. Carmen' brother. There was a connection. It could be revenge. Was he going to sell... the real ones? How were they going to pull that off? Was the world full of delusional people? Could somebody truly believe that Lucifer was actually... Her head swam at the thought. She felt almost nauseous.

When Ella silently reappeared at her side and squeezed her hand, probably after hearing at least the last part of what the man said, Chloe found the courage to ask.

“What is he selling?”

She could feel everyone hold their breath. Even on the other end of the line, there was hesitation, almost fear.

“I mean, it can’t be real though, right?” the person started to ramble nervously. “I guess they used some kind of implants? Still, I never took the guy for such a freak, you know?”

“Thomas” Mazikeen warned, tapping one of her heels on the floor.

“Thomas,” Chloe echoed then, trying to soothe the guy with a gentler tone, “what is he selling?”

Thomas cleared his throat, the audio of the call crackling with it.

“He... he claims to be selling the fallen angel.”

______♠______

  
  
  
  



	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It goes on. Just read.

Chloe’s ears rang. Around her, confusion spread like a fever.

“What?” Dan asked, grabbing the phone from Mazikeen’s hand in a surge of boldness before the woman took it back from him, ever jealous of her possessions.

“You’re kidding, right?” Ella yelped.

“Jesus" Dan breathed out, raking a hand through his short hair.

“What?!” Chloe repeated.

“Quiet!” Mazikeen spoke up, her free hand in the air to lay down the law, before looking at Chloe with intent. As if Chloe had all the answers. The only thing she had were more questions, and a scream she wouldn't allow to come out. This was utter nonsense! This was… no! Stop! 

Just think, think, think, think.

“Do you know where this Dylan is now?” she heard herself say.

“No, he is very careful about staying hidden until the very last moment before the event. But I think I can find out the address of the venue if you give me a bit more time" Thomas replied. “I'll text it to Maze as well as the time, once I know it.”

It’s a good thing the guy was smart enough not to inquire further on why they sounded so scared about something that was supposed to be impossible. Chloe didn’t have the energy to go on. Her thoughts were running in circles trying to take in all this insanity. Maybe she didn’t appear to have any energy in general, because Dan looked at her fondly and then took over.

“After you do, can you get us in? Put us on the guest list with fake names?” he asked before thinking out loud for everyone to hear, all practical and detective-like. “Being outnumbered shouldn’t necessarily be a problem with Maze there, but we might have a hostage to rescue. I'd say we do this the sneaky way instead of just barging in, or we might put him in more danger.”

Chloe stared back at him with gratitude, moved by his thoughtfulness toward Lucifer’s wellbeing.

“Sorry, man, I’m not close with the guy. And the buyers are all chosen very carefully right now and personally invited. Besides, I'm out of that racket now. All I can offer is info, not access.”

“The catering” Ella blurted out, earning herself a series of quizzical looks. “People drink gallons of champagne during these things. If they hired a company, see if you can tell us which one and we’ll find a way to pose as waiters. Hopefully, they’ll be under less scrutiny than the guests.”

Mazikeen eyed the forensic scientist up and down in appreciation before her former bounty’s answer. If the man was confused by the plan they were concocting, he didn’t show it, focusing exclusively on giving direct, useful answers. Chloe liked him already.

“It might take me even longer to find out but... sure, anything for Maze.”

“Aw, thank you, sweet cheeks” the woman cooed, flashing her white smile to the screen as if the man could see her. There was a sigh on the other end of the line.

“I asked you not to call me that.”

“Whatever” she rolled her eyes annoyed. “Let me know. Soon.”

And she disconnected the call.

“There was nothing down there and there are no security cameras in the side alley, so I'll go to the lab while we wait" Ella informs them, squeezing Chloe’s hand again before releasing it – only now, Chloe realized she had been holding it the entire time. “I'll see you guys at the precinct?”

She nods. Dan did too but wouldn’t join Ella to get down as Chloe expected. Once the doors closed and the elevator started going down, he said, “Chloe, this is insane! How can you believe that? We don't even know for sure it is him for real! And if it is, this is a human trafficking situation – well, not the sane kind as far as any human trafficking can be sane and I realize how crazy this is and shit… but if you believe this is a lead then why are you going on like this? I mean, you’ve already put up a BOLO on angel wings and besides the fact how silly this whole lead might be there is a connection at least! Are you sure we shouldn’t involve the LAPD or the FBI?”

Chloe sighs. She knew they’ll go in barely prepared, and too personally involved to think clearly. She knew all of this was crazy, even with the connections at hand. She knew this was what Dan was saying, and that his worry meant he had Lucifer's best interest at heart. But...

“Listen, Dan, I know this is insane and I can't even believe I'm saying that but somehow I just know this is it! It’s already bad enough that this sicko is letting a bunch of billionaires in on a strange auction where he tried to sell an eccentric lunatic off as the devil or a fallen angel but Dan, I don’t trust any authority to be able to handle it, and we don’t have any proof to make anybody follow this so they will storm the place. Who knew what would happen to Lucifer if the knowledge of us knowing about this spread to the top of the chain of command just to find that nobody believed this crazy shit and go to help? These people are insane!" Chloe shook violently now. It was as if everyone had gotten a strange fever! Herself included. "But this time it’s not just Lucifer who follows through with all this …. Whatever this is! I’ve seen them! I’ve seen the people at the last auction! They want to be blinded! They want to believe and seize any chance to get their hands on anything they even remotely believe to be of divine origin. And they would pay any, ANY price to get what they want! They don’t care how silly it is! And I firmly believe they would even buy a man if somehow somebody can convince them they’re buying the devil, a fallen angel. And then there's the man who stole those fake wings from Lucifer. Something happened to him! I have no Idea what and if he does believe this something was Lucifer then I don't know...”

Her ex-husband gaped at her, overwhelmed by the pile of information she just dropped on him and kept his silence.

“Do I want to know more?” he asked, raising one eyebrow.

“Nope.”

“Great! Now that it’s settled,” Mazikeen scowled, then clapped her hands, “I'll put my bounty hunting skills to good use and try to track down this piece of shit. You guys are welcome to do the same in your own boring, ineffective way. I'll let you know if I find him or if Thomas texts me.”

Heels clicking on the floor, she turned around and stormed off, disappearing with the elevator as it went down.

Chloe and Dan stepped into the elevator as soon as it was back up. Chloe didn’t know if it’s the jerking motion of it as it started going down, but nausea gripped her stomach and throat again, so she braced herself against the wall behind her and closed her eyes to will it away.

“Chloe" Dan whispered, tentative. She realized it had been a long time since they’ve been alone together, without Trixie or Lucifer or other cops around. She didn’t know what to make of it.

“I'm fine," she said, but it didn’t come out right, and she knew it. Her voice sounded weak and whiny to her ears. Her eyes burned under her closed eyelids, but she wouldn’t let herself cry. She didn't even understand why she was so upset. She didn't even know what there was between her and Lucifer right now. He's just her partner. A strange, delusional, eccentric, unbearable partner.

“Come here" she heard, and then two strong arms were around her, pulling her close. She pressed her face in the crook of Dan's neck and let him place a hand behind her head and another on her back, let him hold her for a moment. She grabbed his grey shirt between them, probably rumpling it, and shook with quiet rage.

“He deserves so much more than this" she whispered, furious at Carmen and Dylan and whoever else, at the greed of this impossible world they lived in. “I know you have your issues with him, but-"

“Hey, are you kidding?” Dan interrupted her, pulling back slightly to look at her. “I mean, he’s still too eccentric, too rich and too smug and too British for my taste, but... despite what- despite who he is... he’s good to you, Chloe, and you were right, he was there when I wasn’t. I would never wish this to him. I have your back on this, one hundred per cent.”

“Thank you" she smiled, feeling the threat of tears subside. “Come on, let’s go look for this ghost of a man. I'm always up for a challenge.”

______♠______

The collar didn’t allow Lucifer to find a single position that was comfortable besides standing up. He had no clue how long he'd been here. Time stretched unmeasurably and he wished for something to drink, he’d even settle for water, but they wouldn’t give him anything, thinking he might try to pull some stunt to escape once they opened his small glass prison even for a moment. They were not wrong. He needed sleep, but whenever he sat down and started dozing off, his head lolled to the side and took his body down with it until the chain ended up holding his whole weight and he jumped awake at the pull of it around his neck, gasping. And he was slightly cold, left only in his trousers without even his socks on.

He felt so human it was mortifying. Not to the full impact the detective had on him but something surely was off. The chains, the chains looping around his neck, attached to his collar were not from this world. He was not fully vulnerable, not like he was around the detective, but he was weakened. It was as if the chains were sapping his strength directly from his body. He didn’t think he'd ever minded the experience of vulnerability that much until now. Not even pain, if controlled, and outside of work, the pain was always controlled, was something he dreaded. Now he felt too human if that was possible, and too much all at once. Ironic, considering that his wings were out, the very thing besides his Devil face that showed what he was. He had no idea how this happened, why they’ve grown back all of a sudden, right now, right here, in this situation. He guessed they came to his aid when, at some point, he just couldn’t take the shocks anymore. Ugh. Bloody, inexplicable partial mortality. His body didn't suffer any damage from it, but surely it had been draining.

But how, how could this man know about it? About them? He had had no idea himself! He had expected, even counted on his devil face, on his raw power as the king of hell. But his face was gone! Instead, those wings had come back. When the man had asked for them he had laughed at him, sneered even. And the shocks had not had the desired effect on him. But they had gotten stronger and stronger. At least they had shaken him to his very core. He had no idea how high the voltage was but surely way past anything a human would have been able to endure. Still, he hadn’t succumbed. Not at first. But it had gone on and on till he fell apart, his view blackening for a moment. The next moment he was looking in his captor’s eyes, seeing the smug leer in them and then feeling the familiar sensation of his wings on his back. 

And still, no one had tried to cut them off as he'd expected at first. He still didn’t have a clue about what the black man wanted to gain from this plan. The kidnapper had left the room for a while now, handing the remote to a bulky guy who hadn’t said a word, but hadn’t missed a beat in activating the shocking device around Lucifer’s neck just in time to stop him from pushing his weight against the glass or pulling at the collar or the chain to try and break them in half. It was unnerving on top of being painful and the terrifying truth was that there was no point as long as someone watched him closely.

Lucifer didn’t know what time it was but he was pretty sure the Detective was looking for him by now. He could picture her so clearly putting together clues and pondering over evidence, maybe with the whole gang at her side to help her. He could picture the creases of worry and fear on her forehead, and it was painful as well, but deeper inside his chest where his love for her resided. He couldn't think of the possibility she might not look for him. That she might believe he just went and left her again. If Lucifer had the heart to be honest with himself, there was the possibility she didn’t see the clues for the abduction and might believe he’d just chickened out again. But she was his only hope until he could think of anything else because he knew Amenadiel was still more human than even the detective made him. No, his brother was a truly fallen angel right now and utterly helpless against a very rough world. There was nothing he could do to help the devil in chains. 

When the sudden noise of something knocking against the glass startled him awake, he realized he managed to sleep for a bit, his wings folded around himself like a cocoon. They hit the glass on either side as they unfurled nervously, feathers jutting up at all angles in an alert. He couldn't even open them completely in the limited space he had, and they felt cramped, like a limb kept tucked under weight for too long.

“Rise and shine!" the man intoned in amusement, with his smug grin Lucifer couldn't wait to turn into a mask of pleading, shivering terror in front of his devil face but so far this little part of him kept being a no-show.

Lucifer rose to stand – he couldn't bear to kneel in front of this trash, in front of anyone; couldn't ever allow for someone to look down at him. He might have left Hell but he was a king; demons cowered and whimpered and bowed before him, looking up at the throne of their Lord. A mere mortal, a sinner to punish, no less, had no right to think or even assume he could strip him of what he was.

And if they wanted to cut them, so be it, they could go ahead. It’s nothing new, nothing he hadn’t gone through before. He’ll let them think they could have them for a moment, just to make the punishment more intense afterwards.

“How long do you plan on keeping me in this fish tank? What are you planning to do with me? Can’t keep me forever, can we? I won’t look so presentable after some time without …’ maintenance’ and if you try to get me presentable again…. Well, what do you think I’ll do if I ever get out?!”

‘Do you not have the balls to do it?’ he thought to himself. ‘What’s taking you so long?’

“Not much longer” the man replied, one of his palms pressed on the glass in front of him. “And the maintenance thing, well, that is a problem for the highest bidder to solve.”

Lucifer froze. “Highest bidder. In an auction. Motherf-” he stopped himself. 

“So that's why you looked so familiar!” he quipped, feeling an exhilaration from the discovery that probably stemmed from pure exhaustion. “You are related to one mister Carmen, that miserable lowlife! Worshiper of the almighty dollar! How is he, by the way? Did he ever recover?”

He had to admit, it was extremely satisfying to see the man flinch for the first time, his grin faltering even if only for a second. A façade of coldness slipped in its place, all the fake enthusiasm from before forgotten – not that Lucifer minded because he'd rather deal with bluntness.

“Yes, he’s my brother, and no, he did not.”

Lucifer licked his dry lips, feeling a surge of dark, deep-rooted cruelty toward both of them. He chuckled, his voice turning smooth and mischievous when he spoke again.

“Mmm, good. I promise I'll find the two of you a double hospital room to share, once I'm done with you.”

Carmen's brother laughed. He laughed way too much for Lucifer’s liking, considering this wasn’t sarcasm. At all.

“You think that’s how this will go, don’t you? In a few hours, you might get shipped halfway across the world, my dear little angel.”

Lucifer’s eyes widened. Somehow, discovering the man’s identity temporarily sidetracked him. But now, he stopped to connect the dots, retracing what his captor said. His wings puffed up so suddenly that he thought, hoped, they might shatter the glass around him. His composure fell apart, too, but he was way past caring.

“How dare you?” he roared, the fire of Hell in his eyes making him bolder before it died again, gone as if it was never there. “Do you even know who I am? Do you know who made me? Made these?”

He’s never felt any kind of inherent pride in being His son, unlike Amenadiel. But somehow, he did now, because the cockroach standing before him should know better. Better than to think he could sell him off like property. Better than to think he could dispose of him and his wings like he had any right. If Lucifer couldn't put the fear of Hell in him, he'd settle for the fear of God.

“Didn’t He make everything?” the man shrugged, gesturing around for emphasis. “What is the difference?”

“The difference”, Lucifer growled, his fist stopping an inch from the glass to spare himself the inevitable pain, “is that these were not made to satisfy your greed.”

“Oh?” the man inquired, stepping closer so that they were staring directly into each other’s eyes. “And what were they made for? Be stared at in wonder, like my stupid brother was doing when you found him?”

Just remembering his previous wings mounted in a glass case like a decorative stag head made Lucifer’s blood boil, but it’s nothing compared to the rage he felt toward a brother that was clearly worse: a true worshiper of money, blasphemous more than atheist, who felt entitled to anything he could put his greedy little hands on. Greed was one of the seven deadly sins. Hell had special sections for those.

“They were made for me!” he objected, wings straining to break free, even the tiniest flicker of flame along his cheekbone. “They are MINE!!”

The man's index finger thumps repeatedly against the glass, pointing at him and giving a final, sentencing rhythm to the words that follow.

“And you. Are. Mine.”

Fire engulfed his frame and erupted from his eyes, startling the guy for a precious moment that was way too short, telling him Lucifer belonged to no one but himself, Lucifer was his own man, Lucifer-

Zap.

He ignored it, lifted his hands higher to gain momentum and punch the glass.

Zap. Zap. Zap. Zap.

He stumbled back and fell, holding himself up by the chain not to get choked with the motion.

Zap. Zap. Zap. Zap. Zap. Zap.

He panted through it as it kept going, kept buzzing. He didn’t care: he was fueled by a rage he hadn’t felt in a long time.

He could hear the man shout something to the one who held the remote, but his eyes were shut tight and the buzzing from his neck reverberated to his ears. Shocks kept coming but he refused to faint, and with the last shred of energy he thought he could muster, he kicked forward wildly with both legs while simultaneously pressing his wings back against the glass for more leverage while holding onto the damned chain to use it to his own needs for a change.

The glass shattered under the pressure of his feet. This time he fell, but the chain stopped his body from actually sliding out of the now open box. All he needed to do was stay focused for a bit longer, just enough to reach up and break it and he was almost there, shaking from exhaustion and electricity but then...

“It’s not working! Sedate him, now!”

A lot of hands grab him and pin him down, then something sharp punctured the skin of the inside of his elbow. A stabbing, strange sensation follows. From his peripheral vision, though already fading, he could see a dagger, very straight, made from the same material than the chains, a strange, familiar sight again, studded metal, rough just like… his vision was already fading. The last he could feel was his feathers against his face when he instinctively tried to close the wings around himself, rebelling against the unwelcomed touches, angry at the way his consciousness started to slip together with his control.

“Put his shoes back on him and use the other chains as well. But not on bare skin, they’re chafing. Then you move him to another box and get ready for transfer. He'll be worthless if they see the scratches" the same voice instructed, cold and business-like because this was business.

It didn’t matter, Lucifer thought before the drug finally pulled him under. The Detective was on the case. 

She had to be.

______♠______

  
  


For all Chloe knew, this Dylan might be a ghost. No registered address, no car, not a penny to his name. She didn’t remember anyone resembling Carmen at the auction back then, so she didn’t even know if he was present or if he only learned about what happened afterwards and maybe decided to get revenge for his brother’s induced madness, or just profit from the situation. If he had known about Lucifer’s shtick all this time, the guy sure had a lot of patience, because he waited for Lucifer to go through a lot till he made his move. 

And patience isn’t good, in criminals. It’s when they’re rash that they make mistakes.

That investigation was led by the FBI and she couldn't ask them to give her names of witnesses or convicts to discreetly interrogate without making them suspicious. Flashing her badge even though this whole mission was off the record, she had obtained security footage from other establishments around Lux before coming to the precinct, but Dylan must have known how to use blind spots to his advantage and she couldn't identify the only suspicious car turning around from the side exit of the building and pulling into the main boulevard.

She even called the hospital where Carmen now resided permanently and asked a few questions to the nurses to find out if the patient’s brother ever came to visit. They told her he did, in the beginning, but once he realized there wasn’t going to be any major improvement, he stopped. Nice guy, fancy clothes. Polite but aloof. Black like Carmen, but younger and slimmer.

When Chloe suggested trying to track down every single religious relic, esoteric artefact or occult-themed item that was smuggled into L.A. in the last couple of months, Dan gently reminded her that this level of effort required the actual involvement of the station for searches and warrants, not to mention Customs, Border and Port Police. All they would have to accomplish that under the nose of a new Lieutenant none of them knew yet. A Lieutenant who was already far more curious than comfortable.

In conclusion, the only thread they were all hanging by was a man they didn’t even know, an informant from Mazikeen, of all people. Chloe desperately wanted to spare Lucifer the humiliation of the auction itself by finding him beforehand, but today, she felt like she sucked at being a detective. They were only dealing with one man, as it turned out, which theoretically wasn’t the worst of the possibilities she had entertained. And yet, she felt just as powerless.

Because this was a man who had planned this for a long time. A man who had managed to keep Lucifer locked somewhere, somehow, for completely unimaginable reasons. A man who might have been watching them both to figure out all of Lucifer’s secrets and weaknesses.

A man obsessed with his brother, probably trying to get revenge on the person he deemed responsible for his brother’s ailments. Who had plotted an act of sick and delusional revenge beyond any point even remotely reasonable? What else might have gone on in his mind? Who else was in danger? Would he even… 

She stopped herself. Paranoia was getting the best of her again. She decided that as a distraction, lunch would have to do.

There wasn't a lot of luck going around, to say the least, but the good news was that all she had to do now was paperwork because the citizens of L.A. had the decency not to kill each other for once. Sitting at her desk after her sandwich and coffee, Chloe realized Lucifer would have hated this part, and in an instant, he was almost there with her: turning around and around and around in the chair across from her while loudly eating an unhealthy amount of cheese puffs from their oily package.

'Detective, surely there’s a rookie who could do this for you while you show me how wonderful the storage room is,' he would say (had said, many times).

And she wonderd. Why was she so upset right now? What was she really feeling for a man as delusional as Lucifer Morningstar? An enigma if she’d ever seen one. 

And what should she do if she’d never get him back?

Chloe sighed and decided she was done being useless and filing papers for today. Even this simple task was proving impossible with how unfocused she was, now that she knew that all she had to do was wait for Maze's update. So she left her desk and went to seek comfort inside Ella’s lab, a space so small and yet so isolated that sometimes stepping in it was like entering another world, a bubble of safety and warm hugs and questionable music and science, data, facts.

Halfway down the road, she bumped straight into the new Lieutenant. The guy was built like a brick wall.

Chloe stumbled and nearly toppled over just to be caught in a very firm grip.

"So eager Decker?" the man rasps. "I wasn't aware we had some pressing cases right now."

"Ah, no, no everything’s fine. Just routine. I have a question for Miss Lopez regarding my paperwork. Just a little gap to confirm." Chloe rambled on stepping back so the man had to release her. The other stared at her intensely, just when he opened his mouth someone called him and Chloe used the chance and escaped with a mumbled apology.

When Ella saw her walking in, she gestured for Chloe not to close the door just yet.

“Get Dan in here too, I have the lab results.”

Once the three of them were inside, Ella closed the shutters of the cubicle and turned to them.

“Okay, so, there is something about the blood that I could find. I got four different people here I guess... strange was the stuff near the piano. Nothing in the system though. I went through everything in the penthouse and got some samples from the used glass and Lucifer’s flask was still there. Haven't seen anybody drink from that besides him so at least I guess it was Lucifer’s but the readings... A blow to the head, I think. It left a big puddle but it was… well, let's come to that later!"

She shuffled her papers nervously and went on.

" The bloodstains on the glass pieces were perfectly normal. This blood samples belong to three different people, all with criminal records. Armed robbery, beatings on commission for the mob, this kind of stuff. My guess is, Lucifer managed to slam them into the table, then tried to get away, but maybe someone else knocked him out."

The woman hesitated.

"Well, at least I think it was Lucifer there but …"

"What is it Ella?" inquired Dan, "Just tell us what you've found!"

"Uhm, yeah, it is blood, ok? And as I said; I found some samples to compare which I'm fairly sure are from Lucifer but…"

"Well yes?" Dan and Chloe edged her on simultaneously.

"It doesn't have a blood type!" Ella blurted out. "And that's, like, impossible! I guess it has one, but if it has, I cannot determine which one, maybe it's something new, something nobody else has! And then the DNA? It's, like, well it's strange. I cannot explain it to you, but trust me, it's strange."

The three of them look at each other in turns. 

Dan coughed slightly, and then chuckled, "so you're telling us what? Exactly? If that's Lucifer's blood then what? He's the devil?"

Ella stared at them and then forced a laugh, "Na! Of course, I'm not saying...I mean that's absurd! But maybe… well, there's a mutation there! An anomaly! Yes! And that's why, well, probably that's what this is all about! Yes! That's it! The whole devil thing! I mean, who knows what he's been through! What effects these… anomalies have on him. How he grew up! If somebody less… rational might get their hands on these readings, like this Dylan guy, who also blames him for his brother’s ailments… I mean, would be easy to conclude and if his parents were…"

Cloe had a feeling of dread spread through her abdomen. She had been at this point before, hadn't she? He had given her the chance, hadn't he? He had offered her proof. A sample of his blood when she'd shot him and she'd declined. Thinking she had the chance to find out so much more about him and just threw it away… and what was it with all those strange things happening around him? The strength and then Carmen going mad and before that… No.

"No," she said out loud, "that's not important right now. Dan tried that angle to pinpoint Lucifer's true identity with no success. It might be this is connected. I'm fairly sure it'll be how this guy is trying to sell him off as a fallen angel but it won't get us anywhere. Let's look into these other guys you got confirmation of. We can ask Lucifer about his...quirks if...as soon as we get him back!"

She looked at the others and saw her impossible thoughts mirrored on their faces for just an instant. She could even see when they disposed of them, ready to go on. This was beyond weird.

It was Dan who regained composure first.

“Maybe we should try and track them down, go have a chat with one or all of them. Maze’s guy is taking too long" Dan said, fists clenched on the table. And speaking of the, well, demon...

“Guys, it’s her" Chloe announced once she took her vibrating phone out of her pocket, almost grateful for the distraction from the vivid picture Ella just painted. With a shaking breath, she lowered the phone on the table, answered the call and put it on the speaker.

“Maze, talk to me.”

Mazikeen sighed, which was never a good sign.

“Yeah, so the thing is, I couldn’t get my hands on the motherfucker and Thomas has found the when but not where. He is having a hard time finding out the actual location of the auction. Promising and delivering favors, you know the deal. Lucifer won’t like it but he even had to make deals in his name, just to speak to someone who might know someone who has the info. He said he might be able to tell us by tonight, hopefully.”

“Hope is not enough, Maze," Chloe said, her heart sinking as she looked at the equally anguished faces around her. If they mess this up, someone might end up buying Lucifer, for crying out loud. The thought itself was absurd, and so real that it’s terrifying. "So then tell me at least, when is this going to happen?"

Mazikeen sighed again. "You won't like this Decker," she stated matter-of-factly.

"Just spill it!" Dan bellowed. 

"its tomorrow night," came the resigned reply, "we’re sure...mostly."

The three of them just stared at each other again.

“We need to speed this up" Ella urged. “We need to get there before anyone else. But if Maze’s guy can’t find out the place I doubt he’ll know if they hired a catering company in time for us to approach it.”

How they'd get into the catering they still didn’t discuss. A bribe? Pretending an actual sting operation was taking place? Chloe didn’t even want to think about how many laws they’ll end up breaking. There was still a part of her that wished they could do this officially, backed by the power of the whole police department, but they couldn't. What gave her strength was the fact that her colleagues didn’t seem to have any issue dancing around the rules of the system they’re supposed to strictly follow. It wouldn’t be the first time, after all. To save her from the poisoning, she knew Ella and Dan went above and beyond.

“Okay, let’s say we’ll know at the last moment. Who cares?!” Maze exclaimed, her voice overly hopeful and enthusiastic. “I say we storm the building, you let me do my thing, and there won’t be a man left standing.”

Which might sound extremely effective in theory, but Chloe knew Dan wasn’t wrong when he advised caution. They were dealing with a patient man, a planner. Improvising could be their downfall. Besides, no way was a single woman, regardless how powerful and delusional, able to subdue what looked more and more like a very elaborate operation.

“Lucifer included, possibly" she countered, placing her elbows on the table and raking her hands through her hair nervously. “I know what you’re capable of, Maze, but I don’t like the idea of us going in blind. While we fight our way through I don’t know how many security guards, Dylan might have the time to get away with Lucifer and we may never find him again. I want to get there beforehand, inspect the place, pinpoint possible entrances and exits, be able to move around freely without having to constantly watch our backs. Being there to setup might even allow us to get to Lucifer before anyone else saw him before the bidding starts. Which, and I can’t stress this enough, would be the best way to go about this.”

After a long moment of silence, Dan's face lit up.

“Let’s circle back to the attackers,” he said. “One of them might have the information we need.”

Chloe bit her lower lip, uncertain. It’s risky, maybe too risky.

“But if they warn Dylan that we’re onto him, we're doomed, Dan,” she told him, eyes pleading for a solution, a break. She felt like all they’ve been doing was talking. Maybe it was time to take matters into their own hands and in the literal sense.

Dan seemed to think the same, his stare suddenly serious.

“Trust me, Chloe. I'll make sure they don’t.”

And Chloe believed him. There was something about Dan, gone unnoticed by naive, married Chloe, but not anymore by the woman she was now; a woman who knew there were grey areas between the light and the dark, that a cop could be corrupt and still a good man and that a nightclub owner could be the most irrational and immoral person on earth and still be a decent partner.

“Oh, you don’t have to worry, Decker” Maze piped up, and Chloe could almost picture her tongue grazing her sharp teeth in anticipation. “If the plan is to rough somebody up, I'll go with him. So, where to?”

Chloe and Dan look at Ella for guidance. She gulped, then frantically started moving papers around.

“The- the one who lost more blood! We have the address and if you find him, you can tell him not to show so we won’t risk him acting suspicious and alerting others at the auction. He can say he’s recovering from the wound, they’ll buy it without asking questions.”

She handed a specific paper to Dan, and he took it, nodding.

“We’re on it. Maze, I'll text you the address. Meet me there.”

“You got it, Espinoza. Like the good old days.”

Chloe didn’t fully know what she was talking about, but she didn’t particularly care at the moment. Even if she did, Dan didn’t give her the time to ask, because he just muttered something that sounded like a curse under his breath and left. He didn’t even ask her to go with him, but Chloe found a strange comfort in his resolve to deal with this as he saw fit, his willingness to do his part. If he deemed Maze to be the best companion for this, the one best suited to handle this side of him, Chloe couldn't object. She trusted him enough to know he won’t cross the line. Could she say the same about Maze? Well, it’s a good thing the bounty hunter wasn’t alone, then.

“The hunt is on, my demon squad" Mazikeen’s voice announced, startling her – Chloe kind of assumed she hung up after Dan left.

“Yeah, you’re not calling us like that." she clarified, rolling her eyes. In her mind, Maze was doing the same.

“Hell-bitches? Dark Ladies? Devil’s Tribe?”

Ella chuckled and shook her head, then looked at the screen with fondness.

“Let’s just save him, Maze" she chastised softly. “Let’s save our Lucifer.”

Mazikeen’s gruff snort could be heard even over the phone.

“You can bet your nerdy ass we will, Lopez.”

  
  
  


______♠______

  
  
  
  



	3. Chapter 3

Dan and Mazikeen came back to the precinct with an address and the name of a catering company. It was good to know that Maze had ties to the company as well since it was somewhat dubious and well known among certain circles. No amount of bribery or pressure would have gotten them a spot among their service personnel. How Mazikeen managed it was her secret. Chloe and Ella knew better than to ask too many questions.

“Only Dylan and a few of his most trusted men know his and Lucifer’s current location, though" Maze informs grimly. “There’s no avoiding this asshole's auction, it seems.”

Ella was insisting to come with them in case Lucifer would need medical help or in case… well nobody wanted to dwell on it for too long. Chloe had some reservations about Ella, but there was no dissuading her.

______♠______

  
  


Finally, Chloe left Trixie in the care of a neighbor for the evening and went on an adventurous trip with several regroupings and vehicle changes. Eventually, she found herself in a small theatre currently closed for renovation with Ella, Dan and Maze. For a moment there was this uneasiness again. The eccentricities and oddities just piled up more and more. She felt it in her gut, there was something amiss, or maybe deep down she'd guessed it right but refused to admit it.

And the truth was, she might have accepted him far too easily, might have turned a blind eye to far too many discrepancies, had seen too much to still deny that something was going on. Something none of them was prepared to deal with. But now they all were, here, in the middle of this mess, with far too little knowledge for her taste and unable to even think about it.

No way this situation could lead to rescuing the devil from filthy rich religious zealots employing a wayward demon, could it?

Just. No. Fucking. Way.

There would be a rational explanation at the end. The truth was waiting. She would finally get answers. No way could he wriggle out of that one! They just had to put this right.

______♠______

  
  


They were sent in at 11 PM to set up, one hour before the auction, which was scheduled for the witching hour it seemed. The lobby was full of construction equipment and half-covered in plastic, and the stage hall was old and in dire need of at least a decent paint job and new upholstery. The waiters and servers were few, mostly immigrants, and went about their business with their eyes down, intent on not seeing anything they'd regret.

The guests would occupy the first rows of seats, so tables with champagne and a variety of delicacies were positioned along the side corridors, leaving just the right amount of space to walk through. The idea of a bunch of billionaires gracing such a run-down place with their presence was a bit ridiculous and spoke volumes about the trust they'd put in the promise Dylan made them and the shady nature of their businesses. These people had no excuse. This was highly illegal and everyone participating knew this.

Chloe, Ella, Dan and Maze all had an earpiece and a bug under their plain white shirts. Dylan’s men conducted a security check at the entrance, but one of the armed men shrunk in front of Mazikeen's cruelly twisted smile and while patting her down pointed her to where their equipment was hidden. Chloe was absolutely sure she didn't want to know why.

The only thing that counted was that they found their equipment right where Maze told them it would be and that they were ready now.

Chloe still shivered at the memory of Mazes cruel smile. She was afraid the woman enjoyed all of this far too much for the Detective’s liking.

One by one so as not to raise suspicions, they excused themselves and explored as much of the theatre as they could. Armed guards patrolled the hallways, the main entrance and the ones on the sides of the building: a small door used to throw out the trash, and a big garage door that connected the other alley with a storage room, probably used to get costumes, set design pieces and lighting equipment delivered there before usage. The perfect way to move a man from a car or a truck directly inside, and probably one of the reasons this theatre was chosen in the first place.

At the right time, when Lucifer would finally be at a reachable distance, Mazikeen and Dan would take care of the guards to allow their escape from the smaller exit. She really hoped they could do this as discreetly as possible.

Ella, with her innocent face and bouncing ponytail, pretended to wander beyond the stage curtain by mistake. If Lucifer was back there, they could finally set the plan in motion, get out of this hellhole and just go on as usual.

“Uh, lo siento, my bad!” they hear Ella tell the guard backstage, who bellowed at her to get out and stick to her job, plus a chain of racist slurs they all grimaced at.

“Lucifer is not in there, guys" Ella whispered under her breath as she made her way down the stage, the four of them all scattered in different corners. “Just glass cases with old crosses and books – totally fake according to me, by the way. At this point, I think they’ll get him here right before announcing him to the audience.”

Dan looked at her from across the room, she saw the doubt she felt in her heart mirrored in his eyes. What if they were wrong? What if this had nothing to do with Lucifer after all? But that was nonsense, the blood samples were proof, those goons had been very forthcoming under Mazikeens ministrations. They got him. Not really knowing why but they’de taken him and everything now pointed right here. “That’s not all there is,” Ella murmured, “I just saw some movement up in the balconies, behind the curtains, I guess there are snipers!”

“Great. Just great" Chloe muttered as she filled a bucket with ice from a bigger container. “It’s not how I wanted this to go, but screw it. Once we have him in our sights, Maze and Dan will slip out to take down the guards. Ella and I will run to the stage. Let’s hope Dylan was unarmed, and that the guests and staff will be smart enough not to get in the way.”

“Maybe we should leave now" Dan suggested in a low voice as he took care of another table. “Get back to the car, make it a stake-out and try to intercept them before they even enter the building.”

“I don’t know, Dan, we made it this far. I don’t think we should risk drawing attention to ourselves” Ella points out. “They don’t even need to stop, they can get a vehicle all the way in for delivery. What if they see us and turn back? Then all of this will have been for nothing.”

Chloe could sense they were at a crossroad, but fate decided there was no time for doubts. People slowly started streaming in and the staff got instructed to get their coats and put them on the hangers in the far corner of the hall. At this point, the guards were on high alert, the first items were moved to the stage, and wandering off was no longer an option.

They needed to trust Maze that she was as deadly as she claimed and that she and Dan could get rid of those snipers too.

The carefully selected buyers were, as such, not many. An Arab man in traditional clothes with an interpreter and his bodyguard; a businessman with an Italian accent wearing Armani, the suit reminded Chloe of Lucifer, and she hated the man for it; a woman who sounded Russian and strutted to her seat in a sleek black dress and red heels. There weren't more than a dozen, and Chloe tried to file away all of their faces in her mind.

When Dylan appeared, Chloe and Ella were on one side of the rows of seats, Dan and Maze on the other, trays in hand to collect empty glasses and refill them intermittently. The lights got dimmer all around the room, leaving only the stage perfectly illuminated. In the semi-darkness, they all exchanged angry glances as the man opened his mouth to speak for the first time, welcoming the potential buyers with a big smile.

-'Lucifer, your brother got all the charm in the family,' she'd said in another auction, playful and teasing, back when angel wings were set on another stage.

'Right, enough of that, it’s unsettling to see you two get along,' Lucifer replied, and she hoped it was out of jealousy, just a tiny bit.

Later Chloe had laid awake a bit longer than usual in her bed, biting her nails as she thought of the scars on his back.-

This time he was not at her side, beautiful in his black suit and bowtie, and the place lacked the elegance of that first venue, painting the whole affair a darker shade of wrong. When the auction started, Dylan certainly made up for it with his enthusiasm, if one could call it such, but his guests seemed almost bored even as they bid higher and higher for things Chloe wouldn’t even know where to keep or how to maintain.

She grew impatient while time ticked by, and so did they, their wait fed and made longer by the auctioneer’s inventive introductions and descriptions. He got off on how badly they wanted to get to the main course, Chloe knew. He was a fisherman who threw his bait and the fish were all out in the water gaping at him, basically begging to be hooked and dragged out. When the time came, the shadows on his smug face and impeccable blue suit seemed to become longer, darker.

“Thank you all for being so patient," he said, one melodramatic palm over his chest. “As you know, I've made you a promise, and I always deliver. Some of you might remember my brother Carmen's last auction, and the angel wings he tried to sell. Well, it shames me to inform you those were not the real deal. But this, my friends... oh, this most certainly is.”

The buyers were so hypnotized that they stopped asking for food and champagne, leaving the four of them standing along the side corridors, out of the way so the audience could thoroughly enjoy the show. The anticipation was so thick in the air that you could cut it with a knife. Chloe’s nails dug into her palms, her teeth grinding together. Only when Ella slipped a hand down to squeeze hers, she felt one of her fists relaxing to welcome it.

Please, let him be okay, she prayed, not sure anybody would hear or care.

A tall, seemingly cube-shaped structure got wheeled on the stage from the side, a thick red cloth-covered it as if hiding a magician’s trick. A cage, Chloe assumed, feeling her throat getting tighter.

“Ask yourselves how much would you be willing to pay for your very own piece of divinity," Dylan said in a louder, more passionate voice, before gripping one end of the cloth and yanking it away, causing a collective gasp. “I'd say bidding starts at one million, for the luxury of owning an angel made by the Lord Himself!”

Under the cloth, there was a glass case, and inside the glass case, Lucifer and all of a sudden the world stood still.

At first sight, he didn’t look too bad, His skin looked a bit worse for the wear, his hair was mussed and he lacked his common impeccable suit and his nonchalant air of arrogance. But what was really shocking was the sight of gleaming white wings mounted somehow onto his back.

How could that be? She couldn't see any trick, no straps, it honestly looked as if they belonged there.

The man squinted against the light and shadowed his eyes with one heavily chained hand before slowly getting used to it, looking around with an expression of mounting disgust, his underlying panic betrayed by only the slightest shake of his body. This shake reverberated into the strange appendages behind his back. Whatever these sick people had done, from this angle it looked like they were real. The way these huge white wings vibrated behind him, the sound loud against the glass, it was almost too real.

“Fucking bastards" Mazikeen growled under her breath, a low rumbling sound in everyone’s ear.

She looked at Daniel and then at Ella just to see them fixating the same point at Lucifers feet than the bounty hunter did. She looked again, searching for the thing that had caught their gazes even stronger than the surreal wings.

Lucifer was so pale that the light from the wings reflected from his skin, and he looked exhausted, with dark circles under his eyes and a slightly unfocused gaze – recovering from something they might have injected him with, Chloe assumed, but that was not it, she realized. She let her gaze wander down his body until she reached his torso.

There were chains loped around him. They looked old, almost ancient. The point those chains crossed behind his back must be exactly the point where these things must be mounted she realized with relief. This explained it, that’s how they did it!

But that was not all there was to see. There was blood. A slight and barely visible drip of blood trailing down the chains, staining his hips and then vanishing in his wrinkled black slacks.

Bastards! What had they done?

The chains were attached to a quite sturdy looking pole, then to a crude and tortuous looking collar around his neck. Then they crossed with others at his back, went down around his torso and were bolted onto some sort of plate beneath him. They had chained him into a cruel kneeling position that already hurt by just looking at it. He couldn't lift his hands much above the line of his eyebrows and barely around his naked torso. Right now he had put his arms around himself as much as possible and held onto himself.

If she looked for it she could see blood trailing down his legs too. Leaving glittering patches on his trousers, pooling around his shoes.

That was enough. She wouldn't take it anymore.

“Dan, Maze, go and clear an exit path for us. We’ll stand at the ready" she whispered. Lucifer was sort of standing on his own two feet, but slumped against one side of the case; he barely seemed fit to walk and if they'd have to carry him their escape will be even slower. Besides that now there was the new challenge of getting him out of this insane getup. They couldn't cause a scene before Maze and Dan got rid of their obstacles as silently as possible.

Almost immediately, she saw the two quietly disappearing beyond a door, helped by the cover of darkness and the fact that everyone’s attention was directed at the stage. There were only two guards inside the hall now, while the rest had been sent to keep watch outside of it. Two bulky, wide-shouldered men Chloe and Ella would have to neutralize if they wanted to have a shot against the ones on stage.

“Now, I know what you might be thinking" Dylan continued, circling Lucifer like a vulture, his hands joined together. “What if he’s trying to trick us, like his brother? Of course, this pains me, my friends, but I understand. So please, come forward. Inspect the goods and see for yourselves that Dylan is no liar.”

The guests all stirred from their seats looking intrigued. The waiters flinched nervously along the sides of the room, incredulous and scared. Chloe and Ella exchanged a glance of pure dread. 

After a small gesture from the auctioneer, two men appeared from backstage. One kept to the side, holding something in his hand that Chloe couldn't see. The other walked to the case, for a moment his body blocked the view and then the ornamental metal fell and the box opened, its sides falling slowly downwards like petals of a crude flower till they lay flat on the floor.

Lucifer’s arms shook when he strained against the chains but then he suddenly shuddered, his hands moved in their limited radius a little more to the sides to brace himself and not to fall.

“There's something wrong with him," Ella said, echoing Chloe’s thoughts. Squeezing each other’s hand, they watched with uneasiness how the man stepped back and allowed access to the goods. Chloe jumped at the sound of the metal bars which had closed the cage was hitting the wooden floor, then gaped in horror when Lucifer, positively furious, tried to get up and only got halfway before he reached the end of the chains and an unnatural shiver coursed through his whole body and forced him back down.

This time, she didn’t miss the flicker of movement from the side of the stage, and when she looked back at Lucifer, she connected the dots.

“They are electrocuting him!” she told Ella. The other woman stood silent for a moment, and in the meantime, the man behind Lucifer took advantage of his weakness as he recovered from the aftershocks. After being handed another chain by Dylan, he bound Lucifer’s wings together, slinging the chain around the top so they couldn't unfurl fully or be tucked in too tightly.

Of course, they were selling him as a real angel. If they wanted those people here buying the show they had to sell this realistically and if it were true, even with how exhausted and probably drugged he was, the precaution seemed horrifyingly smart.

Then, the man seemed to slip the chain downward to bind Lucifer’s wrists behind his back, before making one last knot around the wings. The metal crisscrossed all along the length of Lucifer’s body now and the weight of it should be enough to make anyone collapse backwards. It was a marvel in itself that the man on stage was still kneeling, still struggling.

“Do you see that in the front, though?” Ella whispered, her brow furrowed in concentration. “It’s like there’s something attached to the collar, under his chin.”

Chloe looked back at the stage, but she couldn't make it out with Lucifer’s head hanging low. Then the man behind him yanked at the chain and gripped him by the hair so that the buyers, now slowly leaving their seats, could inspect the face of the celestial creature they intend to keep as a pet. And Ella was right, there was something there: a splint that connected the chains to the collar.

Why didn’t they use locks? Had it something to do with this whole setup? Should this look more ancient? Well, at least there was hope now. If the chains were only pegged and stuck but not locked, then there was a chance to get the man out of here!

“No way" she heard Ella gasp under her breath, and when she turned to her, she found her looking at the stage through a small pair of black binoculars. She blinked.

“Where- where did you get those?!”

“Russian lady had them in the pocket of her fancy coat. Maybe she didn’t think she’d be allowed to get such a close look" Ella shrugged, and oh, right, she used to steal cars, Chloe reminded herself. Pickpocketing shouldn’t be that big of a problem for her.

“Gorgeous, isn’t it?” Dylan asked the first bold guests who reached him on the stage, slowly approaching a trembling Lucifer in complete wonder, and Chloe didn’t miss the use of the pronoun – isn’t it –, her blood boiled in her veins. “Go on, don’t be shy! Touch the feathers, feel their softness, their divine glow! Imagine being able to look at them for the rest of your lives.”

Ok, this was strange. He let them touch the wings? The craft had to be amazing if he was so sure no one would question them if they could touch. But these people wanted to believe. They didn’t care how absurd this was, how...impossible! They weren’t able to see a man on that stage, they wanted to see an angel.

The Russian woman in the black dress reached forward to touch the feathers, her eyes shining with awe and underneath, lust. Chloe and Ella didn’t need binoculars this time to see how Lucifer’s eyes turned red when he snapped his head to the side to glare at her, scaring her off as she stumbled back on her heels.

“Don’t you dare” he growled, the first thing he’d said so far, Chloe realized. His voice was hoarse and tired and furious, and when he got electrocuted for it, he pushed through it and turned to glare at the man with the remote on the other side, even as the one behind him pulled him back by the chain.

“Guys...” Chloe urged her voice sounding insecure. What was that? How did they do it? It was no time to find out now though. They had to act now! “Please, you need to hurry.”

“Do you... want to... switch... places... Decker?” Maze’s voice panted in her ear, muffled by sounds of kicks and punches and God knew what other moves.

“Maybe you should" Ella replied for her. “He wouldn’t want you to see him like this.” Chloe studied her face closely. She marveled at the calm Latina. How did she deal with all of that so easily?

“No one should see him like this" she replied, forcing back tears. This was cruel, this was despicable, and it had to end, now! She still did not know what was between them, what happened here or what she felt, but she knew it was wrong, she felt such an overwhelming sense of wrongness she almost got sick from it.

A few of the guests went back to their seats after the display of anger, uncertain about their possible purchase, and snapped their fingers at the waiters for another round of champagne. Ella and Chloe split up to serve them, keeping an eye on the stage as they walk while simultaneously listening in to Maze and Dan's dirty work somewhere in the building.

Chloe was now very aware that she couldn't let Dylan and the men on stage see her until the last moment. How many of them were aware of who she was? How closely had they watched Lucifer’s movements before they staged this madness? Would they recognize her? The patrolling guards around her had certainly not, finally some luck, but still, Dylan might recognize her to be the woman who worked with his victim of choice. 

So she went about her business with her head down, thankfully helped by the darkness and that right now the auctioneer couldn’t care less about the faces of the waiters working for him.

She actually wished Lucifer would get a glimpse of them though, to reassure him of the fact that it would be over soon, but his now strangely red eyes were on Dylan, who for some reason hadn’t expected this rebelliousness and his buyers to have reservations about possibly taking care of such a, well, difficult specimen. Eventually, the auctioneer took a steadying breath and kept pitching his product, smiling reassuringly.

“Don’t be scared, ladies and gentlemen, that’s perfectly normal! For this is not just any angel but the fallen angel! Lucifer, the rebellious son, the Morningstar! The outcast! You can be sure God won’t waste His wrath to get it back from you if you manage to tame it!”

Lucifer’s face scrunched up at the statement, his teeth bared and he looked as if he'd wish nothing more than to rip that man apart limb by limb. With the red glow in his eyes, he looked all the way the devil he was advertised to be. But there is something else in his face. Humiliation and something else. Shame – it was too low of a blow, and it hit too close to home, Chloe knew. This man took this whole role far too personally and had far too many issues. Was it too much to ask for him to drop the act just now? Why couldn’t he, for his own sake, leave the Devil thing behind even for a second? Was he indeed delusional? Did he believe himself that it was true? Still, it was incredibly heartless to say something like this so matter-of-factly, as if Lucifer weren't a person and didn’t have any feelings to hurt in the first place. According to these people, he didn’t or if they'd even spare a thought about his feelings, they didn't count. If they bothered to care, if they'd knew him as she did, they’d also knew he felt more deeply than most others– certainly more than them.

It was impossible that he was the devil. He could not be like he was, could impossibly wake all those feeling in her if he was...

“Fuck this." Chloe decided, walking back to the table with her now empty tray. She put it down and looked around to intercept one of the guards, but Ella appeared at her side and gripped her upper arm.

“Don’t do it, Chloe. Don’t lose your head. Please, for him.”

“Guys, if you get him out from the right side of the stage, the path is clear all the way to the exit” Dan's voice pants in their ears. “We are circling back to the other side so that no one comes after you, then we’ll go for the snipers up in the loges. Most men are tied up or locked in closets, but let’s not waste any more time. If you need us to get back inside and help you there though, it might take longer.”

Oh, that was the last thing Chloe wanted.

“Don't. We'll figure this out on our own" she said, the adrenaline of the impending action already coursing through her veins.

When Ella and Chloe turned back to the stage, they could see the guests who went up to the stage had now returned to their seats, some huddled in small groups to discuss.

“So, one million. Who offers more?” Dylan asked with his arms spread wide and a smile on his face, but what followed was silence. Lucifer’s chuckle got rewarded with a yank on the chain that choked him for a moment, but a pleased smirk appeared on his face afterwards, and despite how reckless it was to provoke his captors like this, right now, Chloe loved him for it.

Whatever they had done to him, he was not completely out of it.

“I know the guy won’t be happy about it, but I have to say, it’s a relief to see that no one is bidding" Ella whispered next to her. “Good to know these people still have a bit of decency.”

Chloe raised her brows a little. "Or they are delusional enough to buy into all this crap and Lucifer put the fear of the devil in him."

She didn't dwell on the strange look Ella threw her.

But the hesitance of the bidders was a relief indeed because Lucifer had suffered enough humiliation already without having to hear people try to quantify how much he was worth, like a vase or a car or a piece of jewelry. Like a thing. 

Dylan might act out but Chloe would only be glad if his plan fell apart. She felt afraid for Dan's safety, but he and Maze had the advantage of attacking from behind, and since each sniper was in a different cubicle of the gallery, maybe they’d manage not to spook the rest when they moved along the two sides of the hall.

The whole room seemed to be stuck at an impasse, and in this very moment, Lucifer allowed his strangely red-glowing eyes to wander further down the hall, beyond the first rows of seats. When he spotted them, he locked eyes with Chloe and the red immediately died, his face showing a magnitude of ever-changing expressions. There was fear, almost dread and something unreadable in them. She didn't get why he didn't look more relieved and it broke her heart. “I'm here" Chloe mouthed, one hand over her heart. “We’re here.”

“Oh, that’s right! How stupid of me, how could I forget?” Dylan piped up because of course, he did. “You know, it’s interesting what you end up discovering when you travel the world in search of very rare books and meet just the right people.”

He stepped closer to Lucifer and reached one hand out to touch his wings. They puff up so violently that for a moment, Chloe thought they’d break the chain. Lucifer’s face scrunched up in disgust, just as if he really could feel the touch. Ok, slowly this whole show started to creep her out for real, what was happening here? She looked at Ella again, searching for the same confusion and doubt in her eyes.

Meanwhile, on stage, Lucifer struggled further against the chains, his muscles straining to summon the strength required to resist electrical shocks that got higher and higher in intensity until his suffering was so obvious and looked so horrible Ella had to put a hand over Chloe’s mouth to stop her from screaming for them to stop. They both could see how the current hit him again and again and how he rode through it in a way none of them had ever deemed possible. 

Panic spread around the room when the collar still didn’t seem to be enough to hold him back, it’s Ella's and Chloe's turn to stare as they were slowly forced to accept the unthinkable unfolding on stage. Then the man with the remote put it in his pocket, walked over to Lucifer and plunged a syringe into the back of his neck, right where another splint of the strange metal protruded upward.

His wings stopped flailing, the face went slack just like his body. He remained kneeling, but only because the man kept his upper body upright by the chain. He didn’t drift into unconsciousness, not really, but when he looked back up at Chloe his eyes were void of emotion and struggled to stay focused.

Dylan carelessly plucked a feather off one wing and showed it to everyone. Lucifer even flinched, again as if he could feel it. Could he feel it? This was impossible, wasn’t it? Maybe he was just shocked at the right moments to make everything appear even more real?

Then the auctioneer took out a small knife from the other pocket, without lowering the white feather he cut his palm and stepped to the edge of the stage, showing the bleeding wound for everyone to see.

“Now tell me... how much are you willing to pay for  _ this _ ?” he asked as he placed the feather on the cut.

Blinding light filled the room as the feather vanished into thin air and the cut closed in front of their eyes.

______♠______

  
  
  
  



	4. Chapter 4

Lucifer could barely hold upright. The cruel bindings hurt more than he liked to admit. 

He had felt the pain and strain gain momentum as soon as they’d reached the building and while on one side he had hoped it was due to the Detectives presence he hadn’t dared to hope on the other. It was clear those chains didn’t make him fully vulnerable. They still needed little splints and daggers to keep him in check, leave openings for the syringes with drugs in poisonous strength to keep him pliant. 

He knew now what was binding him though. The night before he had been under constant surveillance but still he’d had the chance to examine his chains. 

It was hell forged metal he was encircled with, hell forged steel that pinched his body and weakened him. An angel’s only weakness, probably the very chains used to chain him to his throne. He had gotten rid of them eventually and never asked where they'd ended up. He'd believed they still were safe in hell. A maybe fatal but definitely stupid assumption. He had had an eye on any excavations sides and he’d thought he’d taken anything interesting or valuable into his very own collection but obviously, he had been wrong. 

These people were far too knowledgeable for his liking, had far too many resources for mere humans. Now he was so weak he could barely suppress a moan when they moved the glass case he’d been forced into.

His body ached. They had employed all imaginable precautions and clever tactics to keep him chained, keeping him from protecting even the tiniest scrap of dignity by means as cruel as effective. But they have still underestimated him. They would see it in the end! 

Last night he'd thought they’d finally found the gall to cut his wings off, taking his most valuable weapons from him, after he had used them in an outburst of violence. He thought they'd finally realized it would be easier selling them separately from his body. The whole gang had come upon him, one stepped behind his back with the same dagger used to make a cut for the injections and this time he could see it was hell forged, it had the typical featherlike markings.

But he had been wrong. They didn’t cut his wings, but after they'd been done with him he desperately wished they had. 

The pain was almost unbearable, he had realized too late what they were doing, but he'd howled in rage and not in agony. He rose up against his chains which weighed even more heavily on him than ever. He almost managed to break through the drug-induced haze, they were pumping such unhealthy amounts into him even his celestial metabolism couldn’t cope with them and the chains were straining him, oh they were straining.

He remembered them, had worn them before but he had freed himself, he was not to be kept in bindings indefinitely. No lock could hold him and even the power of those chains would wear thinner and thinner in time. Sapping his strength and containing it until their capacity was reached. His very being would gnaw at them, weakening them link by link until they would give way but it would take time. Either that or it would take an effort he didn’t know he had the strength left for.

He felt the chains shift around him, his strength building up to higher levels than ever since he refused using his angelic side. But right now his wings were surging and he reveled in their pride and power. He’d still preferred his devil-powers and he still didn’t understand why they’d come back to him but even more than he wanted to strip himself of anything divine he wanted to punish those imbeciles for their hubris.

But it was for naught. He felt the drugs surging and drowning him again. They'd prepped the chains, drenched their whole length in drugs, and now he felt the shocks surging again as well, and even more, pricks from needles entering his body were the hell forged metal had pierced his skin. 

He’d slumped again, stopped himself before he was completely incapacitated. And so he stilled, still awake, waiting, waiting for the right moment. He had waited for aeons till he broke these chains the first time and escaped hell. He could wait a few hours until the drugs would wear off, waiting a bit longer, pretending to be helpless, till his moment came. 

And so he was half awake and heard them talking and his captor Dylan knocking at the glass of his prison again to gloat. He needed to sleep but the pain was too intense now. He had no escape from that human monster and wasn't that a big joke on him? The devil held captive by a mortal? The devil in need to pretend sleep to escape human cruelty?

“Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.” the moron chuckled at his silly joke. It was quite hard not to sneer back at him but the cool surface of the glass just felt too good on his face and it would only have gotten him more bother so Lucifer just kept still, suppressing the nagging pinpricks of his wounded pride. “And here ye are, the monster, the devil who drove my brother to insanity. You caged him in his own body, reduced him to a shivering mess! Why couldn’t you just let him have them? You hacked them off! You didn’t want them! But listen beast, you are not as powerful as you think you are, here you are in my hand, and I have the Sinnerman to thank for it.”

With that the disgusting excuse of a human sneered one last time at him and turned, organizing and ordering while his minions watched his valuable prey. Lucifer allowed himself some rest while he pondered the new information. The Sinnerman. Who might that be and how was he involved? 

He didn't get much rest though. The men around him did everything to torture him, sending random shocks now and then without reason only to weaken him further, not knowing the true nature of the chains and that sapping his powers weakened them. Whenever he was shocked, a little more power leaked from him into the chains. So he stayed passive, even when they loaded him inside a transport vehicle and carried him dad knew where. He accepted another dose without fighting, knowing they’d put much less into him if they’d believe he was struggling more than he did and swore revenge. 

And they would regret they'd ever touched him. 

And then, shortly before they'd arrived, he’d felt it. Felt himself weaken even more although the ragged old chains weren’t as strong as they were, felt what could only be his detective being near and he groaned beneath the drape in his glass cage, straining his wings fruitlessly. With her close it wasn’t enoughyet, he had to wait a little longer, just a little more. 

When the cloth was removed he searched for her and couldn’t spot her. His heart was now frozen in fear. This was not how he'd wanted to show her! But still, being alone, maybe even truly helpless, subject to this abhorrent procedure, he still could not stop himself from hoping she was really there and his weakness wasn't due to some unknown, unholy aspect he could not fathom. Even if it meant she was to see this he desperately clung to the hope she'd be here. 

And then there she was! He looked up in humiliation just to see her! The Detective was there and so was Miss Lopez. Lucifer thought they were dressed as waiters, and they had to be because they stood at the side and no one paid them any mind. They waited for something, clearly, but he didn’t know what. He looked at them and emotions he had never known rushed through him and drowned any pain he might still have felt. 

How would they react? Did they realize what he was, who he was or were they still finding excuses and evasions to convince themselves none of this was real? He almost stopped fighting, only to let them maintain their image of him.

Almost.

Then Dylan unforgivably used his divinity, counting of the fear of his damned customers to get them to bid for something no one was meant to own. Urging on their fear of death and hell with showing divinity in a way that would corrupt them even further.

And when he looked into the Detective’s eyes he saw her shatter. 

The bidding reached ten million and didn’t stop there. He missed bits and pieces in the beginning, then slowly came back to his senses, each new offer an insult, an unforgivable offence. He used to be shallower once and might have even taken pride in discovering how much women would be willing to pay for a night with him. Not that he'd ever charged for sex. He had never minded letting people use his body to get what they'd desired out of it, but with sex, he got something in return. But this… these rotten people wanted to use him in a way that was unacceptable, unbearable. And even worse, they had exposed him in a way that could not be taken back. Maybe destroyed the sanity of people he… was affectionately used to. 

They would pay for that too.

“Ten point two- do I hear ten point three? Who offers more? Now, remember, the key is keeping it alive so that the feathers grow back. Imagine being able to heal your family for generations to come! But if it gets too troublesome, you can always cut the wings off and get rid of it. Just be kind to your very good Dylan who got you this gift before you go, and maybe allow him to take a few feathers for himself, alright?”

He bowed his head in humiliation. Disgust. ”Humans won’t respect you the way we do," Mazikeen had told him the day he decided to never go back to Hell. “They’ll fall at your feet, they’ll pleasure you, they’ll entertain you; but in the end, they’ll always betray you.”

“Don’t trust these creatures you seem to be so fond of, my angel. Remember, they are too small to look at your light without trying to catch it and bottle it away” Mum told him over a glass of wine in the penthouse, turned bitter and overly philosophical by the alcohol coursing in her human shell of flesh. “If you keep giving so much to them, they’ll only ask for more. Give a finger, and they’ll demand your arm. Give an ounce of your love, and they’ll rip your heart out of your chest.”

But then he remembered her, her light, her strength, and there was Miss Lopeztoo, Linda, even the spawn and the douche, these people right here, bidding on him, gambling away their afterlives a little more with every bid, were just a speck of dirt on mankind, they were not representing humanity in itself he reminded himself. 

He looked up at the two women. Searched for them afraid of what he might find after the presentation and found them looking shaken but still determined. Maybe they were still talking themselves into believing everything to be a mere trick, a magician’s show. But why ever they stayed, they stayed and he was grateful. 

The Detective was here, and so was Miss Lopez, and they were both good. But was it enough?

______♠______

“It’s done, Chloe. Go get him. We're coming down.”

The two women had been staring in wonder at the stage after what they’d just witnessed. Could it be? It was impossible! It had to be a trick! But Dan’s voice spurred Chloe and Ella into action. They split up and made their way to their respective targets. The guards didn’t see a threat in them, so they could get into their personal space.

Ella resorted to her thieving ways: with a feather-like touch, she brushed past the man and snatched the gun from the holster at his hip then pointed it at the back of his head and disappeared with him beyond one of the entrances. She reappeared a moment later after a loud thump that she muffled with a cough and Chloe could see the man’s feet on the ground, half-hidden by the curtain.

Chloe had the luxury to be louder because there was only one of them left. She slammed a tray right into the side of his face, then attacked him from behind, basically climbing on top of him, and put her whole weight and strength into choking him into unconsciousness. He had to decide whether he wanted to try and reach for the gun or pull her off of him to get the air back into his lungs, but in the end, the surprise factor gave her the edge she needed and he collapsed, dragging her to the floor with him.

It was messy and people noticed. The waiters decided they might have been paid enough to witness the craziest auction of their lives, but not enough to risk any harm, so they fled in panic. The guests turned around on their seats and looked at her and Ella in turn. Most importantly, they stopped bidding.

“You! Step away from him! Everyone else, out of the way!” she shouted, running toward the stage.

Chloe wanted to arrest them all, she wanted them to rot away in the same kind of cold, hard cell they would have kept Lucifer in if they had managed to acquire him, but tonight was not about that, and they didn't have the means. But she’d remember all of their faces, and Lucifer would too. With a sketch artist, a little help from Maze’s informant and a good amount of police work, maybe they could track them down. If they were not wanted for something, they’d wait until they were, or they could have them incriminated for the stolen items they've already bought. The whole train of thought seemed way too hopeful, so she just filed it away for later.

The rich bastards listened to her, which was the one good thing they'd done tonight. Chloe and Ella avoided them and used the side corridors until they reached the base of the steps which lead to the stage. Ella pointed her gun at the man with the remote and he raised his hands, but still kept it in his grasp. Chloe pointed hers at Dylan, then at the man who had been holding the chain and saw an ancient-looking dagger pressed up at Lucifer’s throat.

“Drop your weapon. Now” she barked, still watching Dylan out of the corner of her eye. The auctioneer was trying to retreat until he could disappear backstage, so she hastily decided to walk up and grab him. She pressed the gun to his temple, bluffing.

“I see the LAPD has turned to more interesting methods" Dylan chuckled, his hands raised in surrender. “This little angel, or should I say devil in this case, has certainly hooked his claws into you. Detective Decker, gone rogue! Who would have thought?”

“Tell your man to drop this weapon and step away" she insisted, ignoring the reminder that he knew who she was. She could see that Lucifer strained to fight, but with every movement, the man behind him pulled him back and pressed the dagger onward more firmly.

“Or what? I know you won’t kill me, you don’t have it in you."

Tonight I actually might, she thought, clearly at her wits' end.

“Detective” Lucifer breathed out, just because he could; one thousand emotions in a word that was only supposed to have one meaning and purpose.

“Lucifer" she echoed, pushing her confusion aside, hoping he'll forgive her for taking so long, hoping he’ll be there to finally talk to her.

Then, everything happened very fast. Ella, fed up with everyone’s refusal to cooperate, approached the man with the remote until her gun was almost pressed to his forehead, snatched the device from his grip and smashed it to the floor. The man responded to the gesture by swinging a backhanded slap that landed on the side of her face, sending her and her gun rolling on the ground with a shout. Before he could lunge forward to try and pick up the weapon, Chloe shot him in the leg with no hesitation, leaving him whimpering and cursing in a corner.

Now freed of the threat of being electrocuted, Lucifer lost it and threw caution to the wind, mindless of the fact that he still had a knife digging into his skin. Mustering an energy Chloe didn’t think he could still summon, he growled with an effort and then it happened, there was no way to explain this away, he was actively moving these wings, spreading them against the chains which give way with a loud noise, breaking into pieces. The movement of those impossible wings forcing the man holding him back with their sheer force.

The man let go of the collar, but not of his weapon. Furious, he stumbled backwards, lifted it and jumped forward towards Lucifer. Chloe raised her gun, aimed at his hand, and shot.

The weapon flew away with a chunk of his flesh as the guy fell to his knees to clutch at his bleeding hand and the hole she left in it. But the commotion distracted her for a moment, and Dylan turned around and tried his luck. Chloe blocked his hand just in time before his switchblade could come in contact with her eye, shocked by his sudden attack. 

Frantically she pushed him back, sending him staggering, she needed only a moment before training set in and she got her gun up and aiming but it was enough for the ruthless auctioneer to turn around and run.

Before she could even think of doing anything the theatre was empty except for those rendered unconscious or otherwise incapacitated.

A noise from behind her startled her, but when she turned back, she saw Maze and Dan running quickly towards them, each of them now armed with an assault rifle they stole from two of the snipers. Dan, covered in blood and sweat and sporting a variety of cuts and bruises, ran in Chloe and Lucifer’s direction; Maze, looking almost as good as she did at the beginning of the night, ran to the other side of the stage to check on Ella, still on the floor.

After helping the Latina back to her feet, Mazikeen proceeded to drag the two wounded men still lying on the stage to the glass case left open in a corner. She threw them in, closed and locked it with a satisfied smirk.

Finally, they were all back together. The theatre had a strange eerie silence. It was a strange setup, the four of them, after a fight, surrounded by unconscious men and the abandoned debris of the thoroughly crashed auction and in the middle…

Maze walked slowly, carefully towards the creature they've come to save. The man? Was it a man? Could they still call him a man after what they saw? Crouched in the middle of the stage where he'd crumbled; blood still lazily dribbling down his back; the wings drooping at his sides.

She saw the harsh breathing and how the feathers of the wings bristled and trembled. 

This was real! It was all real! An angel, no, THE fallen Angel was sitting amongst them.

Daniel traipsed forward, hesitantly nearing the creature, his face still showing an expression of utter disbelief. Chloe wanted to stop him, to say something. She knew he was back behind on the stairs from the balconies most of the time, taking out the snipers. He didn't see the 'show'. He had not yet realized what really happened, what really sat in front of him. He was still looking for the trick, the strings attached, the double bottom so to say. She wanted to shout a warning, run forward herself, doing… she didn't know what she wanted but it was meaningless anyway. She was frozen to the spot. Part of her still did not want to accept what she was seeing.

Mazikeen had reached her former master and crouched down very carefully. Starting to remove what remained of the chains. Chloe realized for the first time that Lucifer hadn't shredded the chains itself, but had broken the places where they had been knitted together with scraps of the strange metal they've been made of. When Maze tugged at the splints holding the collar she wanted to scream 'No! Don't release him!' but she still kept quiet, frozen on the spot. Slowly it dawned on her, if there was no rational explanation popping up very soon, if it was truly real, then her roomie was a demon! She had lived together with a real fucking demon!

Her throat constricted and she fought for breath when she registered a movement at her side. Ella was moving forward very tentatively. Her eyes were fixated on Lucifer's face. He had not looked up once since the action had stopped. He barely moved. His breathing was harsh and exhausted. His eyes were half-closed and he looked as if he fought to stay conscious. Ella softly touched his face and he startled a little but was too tired to do anything else. The Labtech kept the Collar steady while the demon removed the splints. 

Meanwhile, Dan had rounded the cowering man and stood to stare at his back. His face was unreadable.

"Oh man," he started and shook his head. "What the hell…" his voice drifted off and he kept staring.

Chloe still was frozen by a current of opposing feelings. Caught in a tornado of impulses, still unable to sort it out.

She startled when Maze gave a hesitant tuck to the chains vanishing behind Lucifer's back eliciting a strangled outcry from him that sounded so gut-wrenching it made tears spring to the detective's eyes. She stumbled forward a few steps but then she froze again caught in the web of her contradicting emotions.

Dan's face contorted into pure disgust though, his gaze was still glued to the man's back. "Holy shit!" he exclaimed when he hesitantly stepped forward, crouching behind the wings and reached forward towards something she couldn't see from her point of view. He moved around behind her partners back and she could hear chainlinks clinking together in a grating sound, the next thing happening was a gurgled cry from Lucifer. He slumped forward, caught by Maze and Ella, his wings flared sideways and the movement caused another cry. 

Breathing heavily she stepped forward, every cry of pain overruling her instincts, driving her towards the man she had trusted despite believing him to be delusional. She sidestepped the twitching wings and caught a first glimpse of the cruelty in front of her.

The wings were real! There was no denying that anymore. She could see the joints attached naturally to his bared back. Even more, she could see the muscles moving under the skin along with them, she could see how they caused the twitching and movement of those celestial limbs.

And she could see them bleeding.

The broad bases, attached were his scars had been, were encircled by those strange, rough chains. But those were not just wrapped chafing around the wings! Those sick bastards had pierced the flesh and threaded the chains through the gaping wounds below and above the bones. Chloe felt sick. She raised her hands to her face covering her mouth and tears sprang to her eyes.

Daniel cussed lowly under his breath and she saw fresh blood squirting from the gruesome wounds dripping over his hands while he slowly, gently loosened the splints holding the chain links together before carefully pulling the chains themself out of the wounds inch by inch.

The expression on her ex-husband’s face showed he was not dealing with the revelation just yet. All he saw was the pain and all he focused on was helping a wounded person. 

She turned around again her eyes got caught by Lucifer's. She looked at him he looked at her and it seemed neither could break the gaze.

"Detective," his voice was rough and so, so low. Shy and fearful. "I'm so sorry! I wanted to tell you!"

Her breath caught in her throat and the turmoil was there again. She felt… something surging in her heart. There was a feeling, a pull so overwhelming and strong she couldn't bear it. She wouldn't allow it, would not give in to this impossible madness! She took a slight step back and the hope in his eyes was recognizable for the first time at the very moment it vanished. 

The sudden longing surging in her heard at this sight was resolutely suppressed. She crushed the impulse to touch him, to reassure him. The feelings surging in her heart were just too much to bear after this revelation.

"We have to leave," she stated coolly. "We cannot stay here. Hospital is out of the question, where can we go? And as soon as we're gone, we need to call this in. Those people around here, we can't just leave them."

With the chains falling from the creature crouching in front of her, walls went up in herself. She couldn't deal with this now. She _ wouldn't _ deal with this right now. So she fled into dealing with more practical issues as her usual coping mechanism.

______♠______

  
  



	5. Chapter 5

He felt as if his heart had shattered. The pain was drowning even the physical pain of his body. He felt numb, barely registered what happened anymore. The Detective, his Detective wasn't touching him. Wasn't even looking at him anymore. Strangely effective she organized everything, arranged their exit. But she didn't ride with him. It was Maze and Daniel who got him to LUX, got him into his home. 

Daniel was strangely calm when he helped him get rid of the last pieces of metal. Maze was up and about gathering all and every tiny piece of hell forged metal. Then they were off on their way to LUX.

As soon as the detective was out of range Lucifer’s strength recovered quickly and the healing started. But he wasn't able to put his wings away just now since the wounds on the joints were hell made and healed agonizingly slow. It still prevented him from folding them and pain was still pulsing dully through his flesh but he barely registered it. It would heal. 

But seeing the detective’s eyes grow cold and indifferent had broken something inside him. 

Now he sat there on his sofa slumped forwards, wings on display. He sat there passively, only getting himself together a little when Maze left. He nodded towards her, appreciating her help in all of this and after putting the chains into the safe for now she left to go back to Linda. Now he was here and watched Dan who finally had his inevitable meltdown.

The man let himself fall into the seat opposite the sofa. He panted heavily and looked him up and down. One could literally see reality catching up with him and the truth sinking in. Lucifer had always thought the Douche being a bit on the slower side of connecting dots but this was unbelievable. It seemed the human had honestly just understood what everything he had witnessed truly meant.

"So, it was all real? Everything you said was… true?" the man finally forced out while staring at the devil like a mouse at the cat.

"Yes," Lucifer simply stated. He was too fatigued to elaborate but did it anyway. The man had gotten him home safely. He owed him. "Never lie, remember?"

"So… you're the devil." this was not a question so he did not honor it with an answer. He just looked down between his hands.

"You're… you're not what I'd expected." Dan stated slowly calming his breath.

Lucifer huffed a joyless laugh. Just a push of air. "Really?" he could not avoid being sarcastic.

He tried to get up but even the slightest movement of his wings, even just the tension in preparation of lifting them up was scathing. So he looked at the human instead. 

"Could I bother you to fetch us a drink? Might help." he quipped. 

The other startled and slowly moved over to the bar. He didn't look broken, just insecure. One more point for the douche.

He took the next bottle he could reach and two glasses then returned to his seat with somewhat reluctant movements.

Daniel put the glasses on the table and hesitantly sat back again. Watching him as if he expected Lucifer to jump at him if he moved too fast.

Lucifer sighed and felt inclined to do it again when he saw the other man tense even at that little motion. Very, very carefully without moving his back more than absolutely necessary he leaned forward and grabbed the bottle of whisky Daniel had brought. He unscrewed the lid carefully and took his time filling the glasses. 

Then he took one, set it firmly in front of Daniel before setting back with his own one, bottle in reach.

He would definitely drown more than just this one bottle tonight. He almost wished he had some of the drugs they've shot him up for the auction, even though those definitely hadn't been the fun kind. 

He sipped some whiskey and bowed his head, leaning heavily onto his elbows. He wished the other would freak out already and get this over with so he could retreat to his bedroom after drowning the contents of the whole bar and any drug he could get his hands on.

Everything for just the tiniest moment of relief. He knew all the drugs in town wouldn't do him much good, the expression on the Detective Decker's face was burned into his eyelids and swam into his mind whenever he let his thoughts wander.

"So D-Daniel, anything I could do for you right now? I must admit, you're taking this rather calmly. A complicated one after all." 

"You wanted to call me 'Douche' again didn't you?" The other snorted. "Charming. It looks like some things never change."

Lucifer risked a look and saw the other relaxing slightly. The man still watched him closely but sipped his drink.

He waited. The state he was in right now and the situation they'd found him in should contribute to acceptance at least. Well, at least one could hope. 

It would be one good thing to come out of this whole mess. 

He sighed again. He was tired. Even the devil needed sleep and he was so exhausted. Since his abduction had happened only two days had passed but they had been terrible days. Straining days, followed by two nights without any sleep, without reprieve but plenty of torture. 

His mind wandered back again. Back to his captivity. Back to that torture. His body still felt sticky from the blood and...

He took a deep breath and hauled himself up. 

"You are welcome to stay as long as you need," he rasped, carefully trying to move his wings and cringing at the pain. "I'll be at your service and answer any questions you might have. I owe you for what you've done and I always pay my debts but give me a moment. I need a shower." with that he turned and left the human behind without a second glance. He almost made it to the doorway without stumbling. 

Almost.

It took some rearranging of limbs but he managed to get rid of his trousers and shoes as soon as he reached the bedroom. He didn't bother with the laundry basket and threw them directly in the trash. No way he would ever wear them ever again.

He felt tainted. Too many had touched him against his will, had used him. He felt dirty in a way he hadn't even felt after the fall. After all these times, after everything that happened, this was a first. 

Not even his father had ever made him feel this way. He had no idea how or why, but so far the people who had beaten him, made him kneel had either been equals, superiors(Dad) or willing sexual partners and then it had been all for fun. 

The situations that led to him losing control were either fighting, and as much as he hated to admit it, it was no shame to lose against the creator of the universe, or pleasure. 

This time it was pure humiliation from the hands of beings so far beneath him, so unequal and weak but he had always respected them, would never have done to them what they did to him. They called him evil but he'd never done any of this to anybody.

And still, no one had cared. No one had come. None of his family had been there to prevent it. He was abandoned by everybody except a few humans. And now that they knew? Maybe he had even lost them too.

The boiling hot water rained down on him, he spread his wings under the spray of the opulent showerheads in the cubicle big enough for an orgy but still, his feathers rubbed against the glass walls. He remembered far too clearly the cramped tightness of the glass cube and shuddered at the memories. He puffed his feathers while blood washed down the drain. The lost angel leaned his head against the wall and cried. 

"Chrm." 

Lucifer twitched. Till he'd heard the slight cough he had for a moment completely forgotten he was not alone. He turned his head away to hide his red-rimmed eyes.

"What is it?" he rasped a bit rougher than he'd intended.

It was the Douche. Of course. He had no inclination to break down in front of another human right now. Especially not this one.

"Ella called. They have gotten a result of the stuff those guys have shot you up with…"

"Oh?" this could be interesting. Maybe he could use that. It had almost taken him out. If he could get his hands on it…

"It was a mixture of barbiturates, opioids and Batrachotoxin, that's frog poison."

He shuffled back towards the shower wall. Didn’t sound good.

"It is one of the strongest neurotoxins known to men. It is absolutely lethal and very damaging to the body. Ella told me that since you are definitely not human and obviously not dead either it seems it didn't work on you as it should. But she also said that you are a living being and obviously it affected you somehow and now it could still have...side effects.” 

The man edged closer carefully.

“So I was afraid...well, when you didn't come back…I've just seen you bleed man! And I saw what it did to you back in that theatre so I..." he trailed off again.

Lucifer turned his head around and fixed his gaze on the man.

"You arn’t trying to tell me you were… concerned for my well being are you?"

The other looked taken aback by this. His eyes showed insecurity bordering on fear and he took a step back.

Lucifer started to laugh. It began as a chuckle but it swelled. He heard it ringing in his ears, could hear his laughter become more and more hysterical. He shoved himself away from the wall, shaking his head in denial, still barking this humiliating, hysterical laughter and stepped in front of the human in all his splendid naked glory. He spread his wings as far as the blasted things were going to move, which infuriatingly still was rather pathetically little.

He moved towards the other, ignoring his weak swaying and the slouch in his steps, willing himself into as imposing a posture as possible.

"Look at me human!" He thundered out in between the now outright maniacal laughter, "I'm the devil! I'm the literal devil! How dare you!" His laughter turned to a mixture of even more laughing and sobbing, tears streamed down his face without him realizing. "What's there to care for? What's to consider? Why bother? Who could ever…." He stopped himself, he really couldn't go there. No thinking of Chloe, no, better not. 

"Aren’t I the embodiment of evil? No one else cares! They fear me, doubt me, hate me! Not just those who just got to know me, no! Even those who have known me for aeons don't bother and then you come! You come and tell me..." 

He let his eyes drift away again. Cries still mingled with giggles while he stood there, looking downwards, still shaking his head. He felt numb.

"I don't know what to feel or what to do." the man right in front of him started with a shaking voice. "I don't really know what to expect...from the devil. I might be catholic but I'm not a believer. Nothing of what I've been taught helps me here. It is all so… nonsensical thinking about what it is written down in scripture to be real. So what does this mean? You aren’t human, that's crystal clear but what are you? All that supernatural shit aside, all I can deal with is what I see and that I know to be real. So you might not be human but you are...alive. You bleed; you obviously need sleep, you are affected by what happened to you, you have… personality. And issues, definitely you have issues."

Despite the situation they both chuckled at that.

"And then there are the lab results. There is… biology can quantify you. You're not all ethereal and crazy stuff. You have...DNA and..and your blood is strange but it is blood."

Lucifer looked back at the man, the tiniest flicker of hope in his eyes.

"Don't get me wrong now. This is hard and in a way I'm freaking out right now but… it has always been the easiest way for me to just… surf the tides as they come. Got me into lots of trouble now and then. But I don't know how else to deal with that and this is the way I am. It's easier to wait and see, rolling with the punches as they come."

He turned his head away, avoiding Lucifer’s eyes and accidentally catching an eyeful of some more interesting body parts. Blushing he looked up again. 

"You're still bleeding, did you know that?"

Lucifer looked down on himself and saw it was true. A tiny trickle of blood ran down his tights from the wing joints but it was much less than before. He sighed.

"Oh, bloody hell." with a groan he moved forward to the living room and ripped the safe open so vigorously it almost tore from its hinges. He grabbed the demon-knife and then he vigorously shook his wings till most of the water had slid off the feathers.

Nauseating dizziness washed over him. 

He spun around and pushed the blade towards the human who had hesitantly trailed after him like a sad little dog. 

“There’s an easy solution for all of this!” he barked. “Just cut them off of me!”

Daniel shrunk back, pure panic erupted on his face. 

“Lucifer I can’t I…”

“Cut them OFF!” The roar made all the glass in the penthouse rattle. Lucifer felt his eyes flare in a fire for an instant, but his face was stubbornly hidden. Even that flare was no more than the tiniest flicker, it was as if his devilness died down with every ticking second. This whole ordeal took away his own truth, his core. 

“This isn’t me! This isn’t what I am! I didn’t ask for them! I had them cut off before for a reason and I won’t accept them back! Nothing of this would have happened without them so if you’ve been honest, if you really want to help me, do me a deed and cut them off!”

The man gasped and his breath was hitching when he took the blade. With a furious glare, the angel turned and bent his knees another time, kneeling in front of a human being, baring his back, his fury burying his shame, his humiliation. He would not accept this. He would not become a plaything of his father or whatever cruel fate had tacked these damned things back on. 

His blood rushed through his veins when he held still while the man shakingly and tentatively tried the first cut. The rush in his ears became so loud he couldn’t even hear the man's desperate sobs while he did as he’d been ordered. 

When it was done Daniel lead him to his bed and Lucifer let himself fall face down on the smooth sheets. Tentatively Dan lowered himself onto the edge of the bed and gently dabbed at the blood on his back with a wet towel.

“The wounds have stopped bleeding.” his voice sounded dead, too stunned to modulate. 

Lucifer hissed when the man gently rubbed away the blood.

“Still you should not have been injured in the first place. I wonder how this could happen to you! Why aren’t you...I don’t know, invulnerable or something like this?”

Lucifer contemplated if he could trust this man even further. But what was left to give up? He’d seen all of him, even already cut him, what else could he do? In the end, he’s just too tired to evade. 

“Those chains and the dagger. They are hell forged. How they’ve gotten them in their hands I have no idea. I’m mostly invulnerable. My siblings can harm me, Maze can harm me, this metal they had… it should not have been on earth but I can’t really remember what I did with them after I got out of them after my fall.”

He closed his eyes at that painful reminder. 

“They can’t hold me forever, but no one knew that, they sap my strength until they burst from it and they're already weakened because it happened before.”

He heard the other man swallow nervously. 

“Your fall…”

“Yes, that and I’d rather not dwell on this if you don’t mind.”

He didn’t turn to look at the others nervous face but he could feel him shaking beside his tights. 

“Ok Daniel, you'll get the short version. I had a tiff with my dad, yes my dad is god himself. It had nothing to do with humanity. I got beaten, thrown out and chained to a throne in hell. I broke them and disposed of the chains after it was clear they could not hold me down. No, I really never lie and I have no sway over you nor do I desire to have any more damned souls burdening me in hell as it is. The gift my father gave you is far bigger than any of you knows. It is the ultimate free will. No one decides about your fate but yourself.” the old anger seeped through him while he ranted, “No temptation, no destiny, no deed can send you anywhere, except yourself and your conscience, no one else decides where you go after your death. If you feel guilty you go to hell where you create your own hell loops to punish yourselves. If you don’t you would go to heaven. Only the most rotten, most despicable and deeply deplorable people who definitely know their wrongdoings but still follow it get dragged down against their will and that my sister does and not me.”

He heard the harsh breathing of the human behind him, felt the dip when he sat back and leaned away. A part of him knew it was cruel to subject the other to all of this, but the bitterness welling up inside drowned his care. He turned his head away and his eyes fell onto his wings softly glowing on the penthouse floor in front of his bed; a silent accusation towards him. He shuddered at the thought of what he made the man do. Another proof that he was a monster. He really didn’t deserve being graced with them. 

“So then what’s the devil’s use in all that?”

Dan managed to ask and the fear in his voice made Lucifer almost cry again. 

“It’s my punishment, for disobedience, for rebellion to punish the reluctant souls who don’t do it themselves, to order and send punishment through demons. I am a torturer. My role made me a torturer. Rule them and keep order.”

Silent tears fell from his eyes. 

“I am a monster. My own disobedience made me a monster and maybe I deserve it. Maybe I deserved everything”

He buried his head into his pillows unable to bear any of this mess any longer. So Lucifer let fatigue wash over him. Lost in desperation he didn’t even register the human sneaking out. 

______♠______

  
  
  



	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not beta yet! All other chapters had their proofreading but this not yet

The precinct was busy. Officers and detectives were bustling around. Lab techs, attorneys, clerks and whatever else had access to a precinct mingling with them. The new Lieutenant stood aside and watched. Marcus Pierce had his own agenda, his own reason to be here. He especially watched one detective. The one special woman who didn’t even know why she was so special. 

HIs first move was made, the way was paved and now he could wait for further distractions to happen, for her to become a little more isolated. 

Separated from those she depended on far too much to be of use for him. 

He could wait. His plans would go splendidly. Everything would eventually go just the way he wanted it to go. 

He was ready to deal with everything. -Even the devil himself. 

______♠______

  
  


Chloe buried herself in work, spun a story around that warehouse auction, turned it into a case but it was futile. There was no case. Not without exposing Lucifer. 

She huffed indignantly. 

All this nonsense! All those incidents. Only now did she really understand the whole momentousness of the revelation dropped on them. Everything strange, every happening connected to her partner. They had the highest closure rate of the whole precinct but what was the price? 

She sighed. She felt … well honestly she felt barely anything except some slight annoyance. There had been feelings though. Slowly growing feelings. But now? How was she supposed to feel, what could she feel knowing who… no, what her partner really was? How was she supposed to deal with this?

She glanced at the lab reports Ella had put in writing. They grounded her. Whatever creature it was, it was nothing but a creature in the end. She supposed she could deal with that. She shuddered. If not for the records and findings, if not for Ella’s work, she didn’t know what she’d done after finding out. Running to Rome and searching for help maybe. She laughed at that. 

She doubted he would leave her alone, that much had she learned about him while their partnership grew. He was stubborn and didn’t know about boundaries. She didn’t know what this was between them, and right now she told herself that she didn’t want to find out. Resolutely she grabbed Ella’s reports and chucked them into her shredder. 

This was not what she needed. This wasn’t what she needed at all. She was a normal person for go… oh damn it, he’d even ruined common speech for her! She would cut that down, sort her feelings out, do the sensible thing and keep all of this strictly professional. 

Later that day Lucifer stepped into the precinct. He walked towards her desk tentatively, almost shy and she told him that they could keep working together, that they could maybe even stay friends but that she needed time and space to sort things out. She pretended not to see the pain and the sadness in his eyes. She didn’t care.

That’s what she told him, that’s what she told herself. Just that, nothing else. 

Deep deep down, in a shutdown part of her heart she knew it was a lie, but the truth was too big to accept. She couldn’t deal with it. So she shied away from herself, from the momentous revelation that had nothing to do with the identity of the being in front of her. But just with her own heart and her own wants she would not allow herself to accept. 

So Chloe promised him to find out who had the chains and the knife, to find out who was plotting against him and who gave Dylan all those information and the means to catch the devil. She promised she’d find out with him who the Sinnerman was. 

But all the while she shied back from the truth she could not accept, not comprehend. 

______♠______

From across the room Cain watched them. He knew perfectly well what’s going on. The plan might not have worked exactly how he’d hoped, but the direction was right. 

The wedge between them was just wide enough for him to sneak in and get what he wanted. 

Everything was just perfect. 

______♠______

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted this to be done in 6 chapters but now... I've deleted a lenghty and exhausting dialog between Chloe and Lucy because all of it sounded so silly. Now there's no conclusion and I have no idea how to write one in just a single chapter. 
> 
> So if I write an ending it will probably retell the whole season 3...  
What do you say? Should I go on?


End file.
